Book of Zephaniah - Ch. 2, Vs. 1-15 (10/29/2023)

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Hello? Test. I'd let her sit in my lap if I thought she'd actually sit there.

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Wave to Grammy. Grammy's watching. Ada, can you wave to Grammy?

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Can you wave to Grammy? She's watching right there. I don't see anyone chatting, so I'm assuming it's working.

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Well, I can't okay hold on. Okay, yeah, I can see it. Brian said they can hear.

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Okay, thanks Brian. I can see it on my computer right there. Alrighty, well we'll get started then. We've got lots to cover this morning as we begin chapter two of Zephaniah.

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We finished up chapter one last week. I'll actually speak to that here in just a couple of moments, because as you guys recall, those of you who are here, you may recall we had to kind of dig deep to set the context for the following verses we're about to dive into here, which

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I believe is very important to do before progressing forward.

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But as we enter this second chapter, again, I think we're going to see even more clearly why the, let's just call it the futurist interpretation that we took last week is so important.

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When you look, when you study the book of Revelation, there are a number of different quote unquote interpretive, you know, opinions you can take or whatever framework that you can take.

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Historical, idealist, preterist is one of them. These are all things Brother Bill taught us back when we did our

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Revelation study with him. But another one is called futurist. And basically what that means is that you, when you read

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Revelation and you read other prophets related to what the events of Revelation are about, those are things that will happen in our future, which is what we would believe here at this church.

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And so if you want to kind of apply that same framework to the passages we read last week, the verses we read last week, and then what we're going to be reading today and why that is such an important thing, an important approach to take,

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I think that'll become even more clear as we go through today's verses. So, you know, again, as to why the final, why we dug so deep on those final four or five verses of chapter one last week, that is,

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I think we'll see even more clearly as we go through and why it's a consistent interpretation to take in regard to kind of the way this little short prophetic book flows.

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And so let's go ahead and get into it in chapter two, and we'll take it from there. Verse one says, gather yourself, you know what, let me read the whole chapter because just so we get the whole thing in our minds as we move forward verse by verse, because we are starting again at the very beginning of this one.

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So chapter two, gather yourselves together. Oh, yay. Excuse me. Gather yourselves together.

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Yay. Gather together. Oh, nation not desired before the decree bring forth before the day passes the chaff before the fierce anger of the

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Lord come upon you before the day of the Lord's anger come upon you. Seek ye the Lord all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment.

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Seek righteousness. Seek meekness. It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the

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Lord's anger for Gaza shall be forsaken and Ashkelon a desolation. They shall drive out Ashdod at noonday and Ekron shall be rooted up.

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Woe unto the inhabitants of the seacoast, the nation of the charithites. The word of the Lord is against you. Oh, Cain in the land of the

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Philistines, I will even destroy thee that there will be no inhabitant in the seacoast shall be dwellings in cottages for shepherds and folds for flocks in the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah.

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They shall feed thereupon in the houses of Ashkelon. Shall they lie down in the evening for the

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Lord? Their God shall visit them and turn away their captivity. I heard the reproach of Moab and the revilings of the children of Ammon, whereby they have reproached my people and magnified themselves against their border.

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Therefore, as I live, say the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, surely Moab shall be a Sodom in the children of Ammon is

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Gomorrah. Even the breeding of nettles and salt pits in the perpetual desolation, the residue of my people shall spoil them and the remnant of my people shall possess them.

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This shall they have for their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the

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Lord of hosts. The Lord will be terrible unto them, for he will famish all the gods of the earth and men shall worship him.

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Everyone from his place, even all the aisles of the heathen, you Ethiopians also, ye shall be slain by my sword and he will stretch out his hand against the north and destroy a

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Syria and make Nineveh a desolation and dry like a wilderness and flock shall lay down in the midst of her, all the beasts of the nations, both the cormorant and the bid turn, uh, shall lodge in the upper lintels of it.

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Their voice shall sing in the windows. Desolation shall be in the thresholds for he shall uncover the cedar work.

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This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly that said in her heart, I am, and there is none beside me.

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How has she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in? Everyone that passeth by her shall hiss and wag his hand.

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So, uh, obviously we can gather right off the top, uh, the judgment, um, theme here, but it's no, it's no longer aimed directly at the kingdom of Judah and God's people, which a lot of chapter one was about a good portion of chapter one.

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Now he's branching out that being the Lord in regard to his judgment and is bringing judgment upon the nations as well.

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He doesn't only judge his people for their sins, but he judges the whole world.

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Again, being the Holy God that he is, he, um, from our point of view, quote unquote, puts up with it for only so long before he unleashes his wrath, his judgment upon them.

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In a sense, that's also an example of his mercy. Um, and his grace.

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I mean, I would say there is certainly a sense of general grace given upon all mankind in the sense that it, what would be just and fair given his holiness would be to, uh, to snuff out mankind at any given second, just to obliterate them, annihilate them, especially those that are the, you know, the evildoers, the wicked that don't have his righteousness imputed into them.

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Uh, but that's not how he does it. He is long suffering and he does have a general mercy and grace.

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Uh, but a time comes again from our viewpoint, kind of in our linear timeframe, as far as how we view it, where he doesn't put up with it anymore.

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And this is what we're reading about here in chapter two. So let's start from the top and you just go verse by verse here, because there's some interesting things to look at.

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Gather yourselves together. Yea, gather together. O nation not desired. We're back at verse one before the decree bring forth before the day passes the chaff before the fierce anger of the

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Lord come upon you before the day of the Lord's anger come upon you. Now we begin with the charge to quote, gather yourselves together.

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O nation not desired in quote. This could be a national call by the prophet at this time to repentance before the day of the

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Lord actually occurs. In other words, as we talked about in Malachi, as we've talked about here a couple of times in this study, it's a warning for them to get their act together and to repent, to turn away from the gross sin that they've been indulged in for so long, indulging in, uh, not only on an individual level, but nationally.

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And here in verse one, it does appear that that's exactly what Zephaniah is calling out.

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They need to, as a nation, gather themselves together. They are a nation not desired, uh, before the decree, before the fierce anger of the

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Lord, before his anger comes upon them, they need to get their act together. Um, now that phrase,

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O nation not desired is kind of interesting. I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time here. The way that it's rendered in the

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King James, um, it certainly fits really nicely. If you just read it, um, the way

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I view that phrase, O nation not desired is kind of being kind of given the connotation of this is a hated nation.

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Um, and always has been and always will be through every century. They have always been a nation, quote unquote, not desired.

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They, uh, if you, I mean, not only do they have probably more enemies than any other nation ever has in human history that would, would in a heartbeat, wipe them out.

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And there've been attempts to do that, um, in ancient times, all the way through present day, uh, to just wipe them out, get them out of here because of the hatred for that nation.

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You can't tell me that there are, there aren't also some, a lot of politicians around the world right now, you know, present day who obviously are going to be taking diplomatic approaches and being politically correct and all these things.

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And in making everything, they say word perfect, but deep down on the inside are thinking, man, wouldn't it be nice if that nation just wasn't here, like sure would save us a lot of heartache, a lot of, uh, a lot of, um, uh, work, you know, in terms of foreign policy.

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And it would just make all these problems go away. That's what I think when I hear the phrase, O nation, not desired, just the whole world could just live on without them and, and move on.

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Um, what's interesting though is almost every commentary you read, you look in the Schofield notes over here, you listen to brother

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Otis teach Zephaniah and they all, um, re -translate that phrase, um, to a little bit more literal translation, that being

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O nation that hath no shame. Now that changes it a little bit because if you read

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O nation not desired, it gives you kind of the feeling of, O pitiful nation, everyone, you know, everyone just hates them and, you know, they, they deserve to be pitied for that reason.

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If you read it the way that most commentators and scholars would render it, O nation that hath no shame, it turns it a little bit and puts the focus back on Israel's sin.

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In other words, they have shamelessly lived generation for generation, um, sinning against God, don't have a care in the world about it.

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And now here they are being addressed by the prophet, gather yourselves together, O nation that has no shame before the degree bring forth, before the day passes the chaff, before the fierce anger of the

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Lord come upon you, so on and so forth. So, you know, obviously it can be translated the way that the

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King James rendered it because of the meanings of the Hebrew words involved there, but you could really take it either way.

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Um, anyway, I just thought I would, I would throw that note out, um, really quickly.

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So again, they're being warned to get their act together, um, before the day of the

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Lord comes upon them. Now, more than that though, in verse two, we see a lot of urgency behind the words of the prophet here in making this charge to the people.

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Notice the word I have, I have it highlighted in verse two, each time it's used the word before, um, is, you know, being used kind of as a form of emphasis.

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He uses it, there's technically, it's technically four times in our English translation here. One of them is in italics.

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You could ignore that, but there's three times the Hebrew word for before is used. And then it goes on to describe

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God's decree, God's fierce anger, God's anger coming upon them. So the prophet here is emphasizing, he's giving them a lot of, he's bringing a lot of urgency to the table and getting them to repent and to turn away and to turn their attention back to the

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Lord. If the nation does not repent of their sins collectively, now individually, it's a different story.

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That'll be verse three, but if they don't do it collectively, it will be too late before they even realize it.

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And, uh, they're going to be taking part in the wrath that's to come for the whole world.

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Now, interestingly, considering how unlikely it is that that would actually happen, that any,

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I mean, it's rare, it has happened before that a nation collectively repents.

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Israel had done it a few times. Nineveh did it. Um, I don't know if that counts as a nation.

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It was, it's a city within a nation, but you know, it is possible for a group collectively to repent and to turn to the

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Lord, um, and benefit from the results in doing that. Uh, but from the human viewpoint, it's an unlikely thing to ever happen.

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If it does happen, it's miraculous. It is a massive work of the Holy Spirit that did it. But even considering how unlikely it is for such a thing to happen here, the

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Lord next in verse three makes a point in, uh, uh, here in just a second in verse three to not only charge, but also comfort those who do have faith in the

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Lord and will remain faithful, even during the judgment that's coming. So collectively, the nation is addressed.

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They're all called to repentance. They are all called to turn back to the Lord. And if they don't, it's going to be bad.

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But then in verse three, we have a shift to a more, uh, focused group, um, that being a remnant of people.

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And let's see who that people are. Verse three says, seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment, seek righteousness, seek meekness.

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It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord's anger. Now, this is the verse that I've been waiting to get to, um, and that I was most excited to get to in doing this, this study.

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Um, there's quite a bit that, um, has been wonderfully, um, edifying going through all of it, but this was the verse that, uh,

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I really wanted to dive into in regard to its context and who it could be addressing and so on and so forth as we began the study.

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So here we go, we're going to have to park on this first for just a little bit, because the implications of what's being said here make a massive difference, uh, on how we might perceive coming end times.

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Okay. Um, it could even affect the attitudes that we have about it, um, in regard to, is it something we should be scared of?

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It should be something we should be worrying about. Um, and so let's, let's note a few things here in regard to this verse.

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First of all, we have a group of people that are being told to seek the Lord, as it says at the beginning of verse three.

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What are some of the attributes of these people that are being addressed now? Well, number one, they are meek or humble or lowly.

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They are a humble people and they have kept the Lord's commands. Um, that's what it means in the phrase, they have wrought his judgment.

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In other words, if the Lord says something, they take it to heart and they do it. They keep his commands when they are given his commands.

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So these are two really important attributes to distinguish the kind of people these are.

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Um, these are again, attributes of faithful people or to view it kind of in terms we would be familiar with or terms we would use to this day, saved people, uh, people who have been regenerated and have, um, um, called upon the name of the

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Lord. They're also told to continue though, notice that they're addressed as meek and they are addressed as a people that have kept his judgments.

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But look at the next phrase, seek righteousness, seek meekness. So they are told to continue seeking righteousness and to continue seeking meekness, even though they have been told they are already meek.

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Almost as if this is a reference to the sanctification process as we know it, um, of the saints that are being addressed here.

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Now that's, uh, worth noting because while sanctification, uh, is kind of a

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New Testament term, something that we apply to our salvation to this day and have throughout church history, salvation of God's people.

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Keep in mind the context of this verse is talking about the future as we established last week, we spent a lot of time in the last like four verses of chapter one last week, noting a shift from the prophet discussing, uh, imminent judgment on Judah by the

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Babylonians to talking about global judgment in, in verse 14, uh, of chapter one.

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And so we spent a lot of time last week and, uh, I made a couple of notes as to, you know, needing to just bear with me as we go through it and needing to be meticulous about it.

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And this is one of the reasons why, because it, uh, setting up the context for these verses here are incredibly important.

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So these are talking about people in the future, the meek, those that keep the

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Lord's commands, the humble. And so if that's true, then they would be a, a people that are being sanctified as they live.

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And so when you see this charge for them to continually seek righteousness and to keep seeking meekness, even though they've already been deemed meek,

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I believe that's a reference to sanctification. Now, these things then become a necessary, and let me, you know, just really hone in on these words for a second.

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These become, these attributes become a necessary prerequisite for the possibility, not the guarantee, but the possibility of, what does it say at the end of the verse?

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Being hid in the day of the Lord's anger. In other words, throughout the

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Bible, we are often presented with a rhetorical question in the context of God's judgment.

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And verse 3 of chapter 2 here is an answer to the rhetorical question.

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What, uh, what rhetorical question am I talking about? Well, it's multiple questions phrased differently. One example is, who can stand before His indignation?

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That's Nahum 1 .6. Or who may abide the day of His coming? That's Malachi 3 .2.

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Or who shall stand when He appeareth? That's also Malachi 3 .2. Well, while we understand that these questions are indicative of the complete annihilation of God's target, of the target of God's judgment, we are told that the antidote for such an occasion is to continually seek righteousness and continually seek meekness.

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Now again, these are two attributes that are only possible to attain in the purest sense by faithful followers of the true

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God. In other words, saved people. So there will be people who are regenerate, who are saved, who have their eyes on the

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Lord, and who are keeping His commands, who are meek, who are seeking righteousness, when all of this catastrophe begins.

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When the Lord is just hitting the earth with plagues and pouring out the vials and opening the seals and so on and so forth.

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And while that's happening, and total carnage is happening on a global scale, and people are crying for the rocks to fall on them just to end the madness, there will be people that will be hid and will be kept safe throughout all of that.

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The antidote or the answer to the question, who can stand at the day of coming, the answer is verse 3, those who are seeking righteousness, those who are seeking meekness.

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That they may be hid, that perhaps they will be hid is another way you could word that verse.

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Again, that short phrase, it may be, as it's rendered in the King James. Most other translations say perhaps you will be hid, but that phrase, it may be, it adds even more dimension to this idea because it puts a lot of responsibility on God's people.

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It's a great example, yet again, of the responsibility of man. It adds even more dimension to this idea because it's putting a lot of emphasis on actually doing what the prophet is stressing to do here.

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He's saying continue in meekness, continue in righteousness. If you do that, then you have hope.

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It's the only hope for escape of an otherwise unavoidable anger coming from the very creator, but you have to do it.

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Now, why hone in on this particular verse so much? Well, again, consider who is being spoken to here.

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We've already established that this is talking about a future people, not only in the closing verses of chapter 1, but continuing through into chapter 2 for the opening verses there.

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But who is being spoken to exactly here? How is it worded in verse 3, in the second part there, after it gives the charge to seek the

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Lord, it then addresses exactly who he's talking to. All ye meek of what?

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The nation of Israel or the earth? All ye meek of the whole earth is who's being addressed here.

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Again, we establish the context of Zephaniah's flow of dialogue. It changed back to a global outlook at the end of chapter 1 and into chapter 2.

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Now, this would, of course, include faithful saved Jewish people because, remember, at the beginning of chapter 2, it says,

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O ye nation not desired. So there's an address to the people of the shameless nation of Israel and the kingdom of Judah.

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However, it's talking about a future event, and then it switches from warning, again, that stiff -necked people, warning them in verse 1 and 2 to get your act together, and then in verse 3, it addresses the faithful.

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Of course, that would also include Jewish people at the time of God's wrath being poured out on all the nations, which is what we're about to get to after verse 3, but it wouldn't be exclusive to them either given the inclusive language that's being used here when it says, all ye meek of the earth.

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So this, I believe strongly, is a clear indicator that all those who are faithful, all those who are faithful during the time of the great tribulation, when the nations are being judged by the seals and the trumpets and the vials, they will be hid from these otherwise global judgments and will remain safe until His ultimate return in glory.

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We're told in Revelation 7 .14 that there are Gentiles, that would be us,

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Gentile people during this particular time when it says, which came out of great tribulation and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the

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Lamb. So we know from Revelation 7 that there will be

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Gentiles alive and going through the great tribulation. However, they come out on the other side.

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They came out of that tribulation, out of that great tribulation with their robes washed, made white from the blood of the

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Lamb. What is that talking about? It's talking about a people being made pure because they're no telling where, you know, somewhere safe.

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They're being hid somewhere by the Lord Himself, by the way. Again, this comes back to us having assurance, having comfort as we look forward to these cataclysmic future events, we will be hid by the

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Lord Himself, or we know that Gentiles alive will be hid by the Lord Himself. And in being hid, they're going to be so close to Him in regard to their relationship that when they come out of the great tribulation alive, their robes will be washed in the blood of the

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Lamb. But while we have that in Revelation 7, in this ancient prophecy of Zephaniah, we get a very small glimpse of the same truth.

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We see that we too will perhaps be hid should we ourselves, people in this room, people listening today, experience that particular time in this life.

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Now, here's the thing. I don't, you know, it's all in the Lord's timing.

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Yes, He says that you'll see the signs of the trees budding and things like that, but there's still a lot that has to happen in terms of prophecy that needs to be fulfilled to know we are in that time period.

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There's still a lot that has to happen. There's no telling. And by the way, I've been kind of under the impression for the last three years that with as bad as it is, it's getting so bad, like culturally speaking in this country, but also in other places in the world, that a lot of people are waking up to how dumb it is to take secularism to its logical end.

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Like, how bad it is for everybody. Many theologians that I listen to refer to secularism as the culture of death because that is actually the logical conclusion of taking it to its end, to its natural end.

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And so a lot of people, even those on the quote -unquote left, I believe over the last few years have woken up to a lot of that silliness and perhaps will even come out of it through our democratic system, perhaps, getting different people elected.

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We have a very interesting new selection for the Speaker of the House. Who knows what will happen at the next presidential election?

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We have some really interesting candidates there. So if things start turning around, we don't know.

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Like, maybe we're in a valley right now, but there will be maybe another peak before the

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Lord starts, before more dominoes start to fall. So let's say it doesn't happen in our lifetimes.

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There's no reason to be alarmist about it anyway. Let's say it doesn't happen in our lifetimes. This promise would remain true for our kids, or for our grandkids, or how about our great -grandkids.

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We can take what Zephaniah 2 .3 is talking about and have comfort that even our offspring, our lineage, however many generations in the future, when the

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Lord does begin these great events leading up to His second return, that they, as long as they remain faithful, and that's where we come in, by the way, our discipleship, our raising them up, and the

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Word of the Lord comes into play, because in doing that is how they will be a faithful people when the time comes.

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If they remain faithful, if they remain meek, they will be hid in the day of the

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Lord's wrath. It's a pretty astounding thing. It's really a beautiful thing. Now, one final note, because we will start moving into some other verses here, is one more example.

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I refrained from giving you guys this detail during our introduction to the book, where normally something like this would fit in.

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I wanted to save it until now, because it's just so spectacular, especially if you do take chapter 2, verse 3 as kind of the pinnacle of the study.

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At least it was for me. One more example of just how meticulous the Lord's planning is, is the name

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Zephaniah, the prophet that is writing these words as the Holy Spirit moves him to write them.

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Zephaniah means Jehovah hides, or whom Jehovah hid.

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That's the meaning of the name Zephaniah. And here you get to chapter 2, verse 3, and we learn that the meek and those that are seeking righteousness continually will be hid in the day of the

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Lord's anger. Zephaniah would fall into that category, for sure. But it's just one more detail that the

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Lord included, I believe, for us as an example of his providence toward his people throughout time.

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Not just at any given point in time. Not that Zephaniah was given this name just because he as an individual may be hid from the

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Lord's anger, but because the Lord provides for his people throughout all of human history. And in giving us this little book, he gave us, he sheds light on that in some pretty spectacular ways.

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All right, well let's move on. Verse 4, for Gaza shall be forsaken and Ashkelon a desolation.

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They shall drive out Ashdod at noonday and Ekron will be rooted up.

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Now we move on to national judgment at this point. I'm sorry, judgment of the nations. Global judgment, in fact.

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Nations that cover just about all four corners of the land if you are using

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Jerusalem or Israel as the center point. It's interesting to note the timing of the attack that God orchestrates here.

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He says at noonday. This is one of the hottest parts of the day, and historically those dwelling within the

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Levant territory, so the part of the Middle East that all of the countries, all the nations we're about to read about reside in.

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Historically, around noon, people would actually take about a three -hour rest around that time to wait out the heat.

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So in other words, they would be particularly vulnerable at that time, and yet that's when the Lord says, I will bring judgment beginning at noonday.

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Verse 5 says, woe unto the inhabitants of the seacoast, the nation of the Charithites.

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The word of the Lord is against you. O Canaan, the land of the Philistines, I will even destroy thee that there shall be no inhabitant, and the seacoast shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds and folds for flocks.

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And the coast, this is interesting, shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah. They shall feed thereupon, and the houses of Ashkelon shall they lay down in the evening.

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For the Lord their God shall visit them and turn away their captivity. So just in the matter of a couple of verses there, after laying out the total destruction of a number of nations just right off the bat, we learn in verse 7 that God has reserved part of the coastlands for the remnant of the house of Judah, where they'll be nourished for a time.

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And while there, God himself will visit them and eventually bring them back out of their captivity.

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This is a continual theme throughout the Old Testament, I believe also a type of what that final liberation will be like at his second coming, the once and for all liberation of his people, bringing them out of their captivity for the last time.

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Even prior to the re -establishment of Israel in 1948, you know, they're scattered all over the earth in a regard, in some regard, being captive to whatever culture they find themselves living in.

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Again, I think it's a type, not that they are literally held captive in every sense of the word, but rather a type of just the constant struggle they have with finding their, with grasping their identity in their promised land, in all of these details that they're given in ancient times.

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Imagine just for a second, it was really interesting, I was listening to Brother Otis' tape on this chapter, and he said, and I promise

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I had been thinking this, not in the way that he worded it, but I just had this feeling lately, like what if, you know,

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Israel ceases to exist again before, as a nation I mean, before the great tribulation starts unfolding?

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Now we know at that time there will be a new temple, and that there will be a kind of a covenant made between the people of Israel and the

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Antichrist, and that will make way for the abomination of desolation that Daniel talks about and then that Jesus talks about later.

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But that doesn't necessarily mean that there has to be this unbroken chain of Israel being a nation from this point until that happens.

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I thought like, what if what's happening right now with this war actually leads to some kind of new scattering?

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In other words, does the U .N. establishment of Israel in 1948 have anything to do with the end times?

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A lot of people of course would say, oh, it absolutely does. It was fulfillment of prophecy and all this stuff, and obviously

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God is sovereign, so he decreed that that would happen the way that it happened.

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But Brother Otis, listening to that tape, said the same thing. He said, I wish I had actually just written the quote down.

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I'll have to look it up later, but he basically was like, he shared his belief that Israel, the current state of Israel as it exists, will stop existing at some point before the great tribulation begins.

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I was like, well, that's interesting. So Brother Otis seemed to agree there. The reason why

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I even think that, and maybe why Brother Otis was mentioning it, I can't remember even what verse he was commenting on.

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He just said it. Y 'all can go listen to the tape though. It's on the website. When it says here, if this is truly a type of kind of that final time that the

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Lord leads his people out of captivity, what if it's in regard to re -establishing the nation, but on his terms?

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I mean, I know it's always on his terms, but from the human viewpoint and from Jesus's viewpoint, in time with us as he comes back and re -establishes the nation, not the

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UN, but Jesus, what if it's kind of a type of that eventually happening?

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I don't know. Those are just some thoughts that I had there, but I did think it was interesting that Brother Otis had a similar thought in regard to the nation of Israel ceasing a chance of that happening as we know it before the true end finally comes.

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All right. Verse eight says, I have heard the reproach of Moab and the revilings of the children of Ammon, whereby they have approached my people and magnified themselves against their border.

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Therefore, as I live, saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, surely Moab shall be a

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Sodom and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah, even the breeding of nettles and salt pits in a perpetual desolation.

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The residue of my people shall spoil them, and the remnant of my people shall possess them. This shall they have for their pride, because they have reproached and magnified themselves against the people of the

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Lord of hosts. It's interesting to note how descriptive the Lord is here regarding these two particular nations.

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He talks about a lot of nations from verses four all the way through the end of the chapter, but here when it comes to Moab and Ammon, he really like hones in in quite a bit of detail there, spanning three verses.

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He's very descriptive in regarding these two particular nations, Moab and Ammon. Now these nations were the offspring of Lot's incestuous relations in Genesis 19.

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You guys remember that story? The offspring from his two daughters is where these two nations came from.

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Now oddly in these verses we're told that these nations have magnified themselves. They have been prideful.

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What's funny about that is that would not have been a standard practice. Normally that would have been a very shameful history, and everybody knew the history.

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They knew where the origin of these two nations, and yet for some reason these nations were very very boastful people, even though they're even given their undignified beginnings.

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And so that's kind of odd, but it's talking about those two nations, the offspring of Lot and his daughters.

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Then God parallels their destruction with Sodom and Gomorrah, which of course was where Lot and his two daughters were coming from before committing those acts, which ultimately brought these two nations into being.

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Dave, maybe that's reading too much into it. I was getting something out of nothing.

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Yeah, I sent Dave some funny memes this week, or they weren't even memes. They were actual commentary like people on Twitter or something just taking stuff out of the

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Bible and saying, look at what this means. If you have ears to hear all this stuff, and we're making fun of it.

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So maybe this is making something out of nothing, but it is interesting that God does parallel the destruction of the two nations, the offspring of Lot with the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

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And notice he doesn't say it'll be greater or lesser than the destruction. He says it will be as the destruction.

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So obviously these nations have done some pretty egregious things to warrant that particular punishment.

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And then finally, we're reminded that God's remnant will possess their land, a prophecy of the fulfillment of Israel someday obtaining the entirety of the promised land.

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Katie, you remember in Brother Otis's study of Joshua that you had started, and it's on our website.

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But in the intro to that study, he mentioned that the most Israel ever took of the promised land was roughly 10%.

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But God promised them all of it. And of course, we look at it now and see that the fulfillment of that prophecy will be during the millennial kingdom with Christ reigning on the throne of David.

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At that point, his promise will be fulfilled. The ethnic Israel will possess 100 % of the promised land, and this is part of it.

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They will obtain the land of Moab and Ammon. All right.

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So verse 11 says, The Lord will be terrible unto them, for he will famish all the gods of the earth, and men shall worship him, everyone from his place.

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Listen to this verse. This is, again, of particular interest to us. The Lord will be terrible unto them, those nations, and then he broadens it even more.

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He says, For he will famish all the gods of the earth, and men shall worship him, everyone from his place, even all the isles of the heathen.

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When is that going to happen? When on earth are all of the heathen of the earth going to be worshiping God? It will happen when he's reigning on earth.

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There will be no other choice at that time when he puts all of the false gods in their right place, which will be absolutely snuffed out of existence, and he will be the only

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God left to worship. Of course, he's always been the one true God, but human beings are an idolatrous people.

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And so he ends that to the point where even the heathen will be worshiping him from their places, which means they'll be living in their natural geographical place on earth.

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It'd be like us still living in Texas, but we'll be worshiping Jesus on the throne of David in Jerusalem. So all of the heathen, all of the

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Gentiles, everyone will be in their own place on earth but worshiping the one true God.

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Zephaniah makes a statement here regarding the nature of true worship from the nations during the millennial kingdom.

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That's what I believe is being talked about here in verse 11. Now there, when that's happening, again, just to reiterate, people in all nations will worship

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God in their own land, but consider that with Malachi 1 .11.

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That is, of course, our previous study, and that was a verse that we parked on for a good bit of time.

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It says in Malachi 1 .11, from the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the

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Gentiles, and it goes on to explain kind of what their worship will look like. It'll be a pure worship, but it's the

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Gentiles doing it, which of course made no sense to the people of the

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Jews at this particular time. It was a mystery to them, but it's prophesied yet again here in Zephaniah 2 .11.

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There's some other really interesting verses. If y 'all want to look at these later, Isaiah 2, 2 -4 and Micah 4, 1 -3 talk about the same thing, the

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Gentiles calling upon the name of the Lord at that particular time in history. Again, I believe that this verse 11 affirms this quote -unquote futurist viewpoint of this part of the prophecy.

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In other words, these are things that are going to happen in our future. There are those that interpret all prophecy in the

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Bible having already happened, but in doing so, it brings a lot of inconsistencies in Jesus' teachings, and of course,

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I believe the apostles' teachings as well. This is why we take that particular viewpoint, and it fits right in.

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Verse 11 affirms that. Verse 12 says, "...ye Ethiopians also, ye shall be slain by my sword."

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Notice that while historically God used four nations often to enact some of these judgments,

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He says here, it is from my sword. This is God being the sovereign arbiter of all of the things that take place, using instruments to enact

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His will. In many cases, four nations doing that. It is by His sword that Ethiopia will be slain, and by inference, the other four nations we're reading about here.

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Verse 13 says, "...and He will stretch out His hand against the north and destroy Assyria, and will make

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Nineveh a desolation and dry like a wilderness, and flocks shall lie down in the midst of her."

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By the way, as you guys know, Nineveh was a very prominent city, impregnable. They were very prideful, much like the

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Edomites that we learned in Obadiah and Mount Seir. They didn't think anything bad could ever happen to them.

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Very, very prideful here, and yet we learn Nineveh will be made a desolation and like a wilderness, "...and flocks shall lie down in the nations, both the cormorant," so that is maybe like a pelican perhaps, or a cormorant, some kind of unclean bird will be dwelling there, "...and

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the bittern," that's like a porcupine or a hedgehog or something like that, "...they

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shall lodge in the upper lentils of it," so you'll have like porcupines hanging out at the tops of the pillars of these great buildings.

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Total desolation. "...their voice shall sing in the windows, desolation shall be in the thresholds, for he shall uncover the cedar work."

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So all the way down to the framing of these great buildings, the Lord is just going to just obliterate and basically make waste of all these great cities that are boasting in their strength and all of these things, and the hedgehogs will just be hanging out and laughing at them.

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Verse 15, the final verse of this chapter, says, "...this is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly."

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Think about the parallels again with Edom that we learned about in Obadiah, the pride that they have, they dwell carelessly, "...that

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said in her heart, I am and there is none beside me." Any nation with that kind of attitude going into this judgment that we're talking about, it's going to be a swift end for sure.

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"...how has she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in? Everyone that passeth by her shall hiss and wag his hand."

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Alrighty, so that's the end of chapter two. Now I want to explain something really quick.

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As we read through this chapter, and as you read through it other times, and you hear of some of these specific nations being mentioned, we know that in some of these cases, judgment and destruction did occur to a few of these nations at some point in history.

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But at the beginning of the chapter, we're talking about the whole earth. We're talking about all the meek of the earth.

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We're talking about at the end of chapter one, we're talking about the moon being darkened and it being a day of dark clouds and thick darkness and all these things.

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So how does it fit with the other verses in the same context discussing future events?

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Well, if you guys remember, we spent a good time in our introduction talking about the concept of near prophecies and far prophecies being talked about in the same context.

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In other words, conflated to some degree. We already know it's a common prophetic theme for there to be discussed a quote near prophecy and a quote far prophecy sometimes in the same chapter.

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Jesus did it himself in Matthew chapter 24. I think I've mentioned that like three times in this study, but the point being is that theme continues all throughout the

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Bible. There's often both happening at the same time, and that's certainly a part of what's going on here. Near prophecy, far prophecy being combined.

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But I believe that in addition to that, and I'm going to end with this thought, we're being given a twofold type or in sample as the apostle

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Paul tells us the Old Testament is full of. That's what it's there for us to be.

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It's one of the reasons that it's there. Many others as well. It's a twofold type or in sample of what the ultimate day of the

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Lord will be like for the heathen nations. Okay, so what is that?

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What is that twofold type? Number one, it's that judgment when that time comes in our future.

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So yes, some of these nations were judged historically, certainly Nineveh was, but in our future, nations that are surrounding

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Israel during that time are going to be judged especially strong.

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Now, it's going to be bad for the whole world, but the Middle East is going to be on fire quite literally, and those nations surrounding

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Israel, think about the hatred of the surrounding nations, the hatred that they have for Israel as we speak.

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Judgment at that time is going to be spectacular for them. So if we look at everything we just read chapter two as a type of what that will picture, that's one thing that we can take out of this chapter of Zephaniah.

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But number two, the second part of that twofold type that we may have is the language that is used to describe these judgments.

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Some of these nations in the ancient context, they certainly were wiped out. They faced destruction, they faced judgment, and yet the way that Zephaniah describes those judgments can also mirror the judgments on the nations surrounding

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Israel in the future. So judgment happened for sure for places like places like Moab and Ammon and Edom, and yet the prophets that are prophesying against those nations, they use a particular language, go figure, as they were moved by the

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Holy Spirit in writing them, that mirror the judgment language that is used for future events as well.

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And so we can take in reading about the judgment of these nations and learn something about what the future events that are yet to happen in our life, what they will be like when they do take place, which

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I think is very interesting. But right there, thrown in the middle of those historical nations being judged, you do have specific and explicit future events being talked about.

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The Gentiles, the heathen nations worshiping from the isles, all of the faithful, all of the meek being hid in the day, the ultimate day of the

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Lord's wrath, and so on and so forth. So again, I said this last week,

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Zephaniah is a very truncated book. Therefore, the timeline is going to be somewhat truncated.

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He's having to fit in a lot of stuff in a short, in the very small scroll that I suppose he was given to write all this on onto.

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So he was fitting it all in there. And so, you know, there's a lot to unpack, but you know, we're getting through it and we'll end it with that today unless anyone has any thoughts or anything like that.

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Yes, sir. Yes. Of course.

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Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Mm hmm.

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Right. No, that's very true. And so now what they're having to do is reinterpret passages of the

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Old Testament to fit the way history has played out because the Messiah hadn't come yet.

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So that's one example. But salvation is certainly progressive, but also our understanding of God's revelation as well.

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The prophets, as they wrote all this stuff, looked through a glass darkly and they were the writers of it. And so as more revelation of God was given, stuff started to unfold even more.

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And so now here we are, we have the full completed canon of God's word, including the New Testament, and we can read

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Zephaniah and things like verse three of chapter two can really pop and be very meaningful to us as Gentiles and what our future will look like.

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Anyone have any other thoughts? Then I suppose I'll end it since everybody's making their way in.

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Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this wonderful day. Thank you for blessing our time together, bringing us together once again to fellowship and discuss your word together.

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We ask you to continue to be with our loved ones that are still traveling, bring them all home safely to us.

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And we ask you to be with the remainder of the services today, be with Brother John as he brings a message to all of us and be with us all just for the rest of the day and the rest of this week.