Book of Zephaniah - Ch. 3, Vs. 8 (11/12/2023)

Park Meadows Church

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Well, we begin a fourth section in our study. Last week we covered the whole third section, which was talking about the moral crisis of Jerusalem at the time that Zephaniah was prophesying.

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They were in a pretty rough state, of course, in our first section. We talked about the imminent judgment of Judah by the hand of the

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Babylonians and a lot of the reasons why judgment was coming for them. So it makes sense that Jerusalem was in a pretty bad state itself, essentially the capital.

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But it is interesting, kind of the method or the pattern that Zephaniah used throughout this book.

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He began with global judgment. He moved on to the judgment of Judah. He then shifted to talking about a remnant within Judah, and then back to the rebuke of Jerusalem.

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And then now, here we are, back where we began, basically come full circle from our opening verses, which is the future judgment of the world.

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That was the title of our first section. So section four here is future judgment of the world continued.

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And that will cover basically the first, you know, maybe five, six verses or so that we will cover.

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Now beginning in verse eight, which is where we'll be picking it up today, Zephaniah chapter three, verse eight, we have a pretty interesting shift that takes place.

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Last week, we covered verses one through seven. I guess most of you weren't here for that.

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But in verses one through seven, we covered, again, the vivid description of what we might call the moral crisis of Jerusalem, the city of David, the very city where God's house was.

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They were rebuked, their sins that were on full display were brought forth by the

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Lord himself and all these things. After those verses finish, though, after you get to the end of those verses that are describing that abysmal state of Israel's spiritual well -being, the prophet then gives us a therefore in verse eight.

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That's how verse eight begins. But what follows is the interesting point, because what he's going to do is he's going to tell us, he tells these people of Jerusalem to wait ye upon me until the day that I rise up to the prey.

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That is what follows the therefore, which bridges the gap between those first seven verses we covered last week, the moral crisis of Jerusalem and the judgment of the world, which is what we're talking about today.

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So let's read verse eight together. It says, therefore, right on the backside of rebuking and bringing

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Jerusalem's sin to light, therefore, wait ye, who's the ye, it's talking about those

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Jerusalem that he was just talking to, wait ye upon me, saith the

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Lord, until the day that I rise up to the prey. For my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce anger, for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy.

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So it's kind of interesting because he's talking specifically about Jerusalem and their lack of obedience, the fact that they had not received the correction directly from the

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Lord, that their princes were like roaring lions, that their prophets were like evening wolves, insatiable wolves.

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Her prophets have polluted the sanctuary. The Lord will bring justice about these things, judgment about these things.

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He reminds them how he's cut off the nations previously. And he finishes in verse seven by saying, you rose early and corrupted all your doings.

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So he's talking about Jerusalem there and he immediately shifts to talking about devouring the nations, devouring the world, in fact, with the fire of his jealousy, pouring upon his indignation upon the nations and kingdoms that he will assemble.

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Very interesting transition that Zephaniah makes there. And we know that it's in direct connection, Zephaniah, in this very truncated book, as we've discussed many times at this point, he can jump from one kind of point of focus to another.

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The word, therefore, at the beginning of verse eight, though, again, bridges the gap and makes it known to us that this is specifically, that this is intended to be in the same context that Zephaniah was just talking about Jerusalem within.

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Very interesting stuff. This is the first, if you look at verse eight, it's the first explicit return to the universal judgment that the whole book began with.

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If you guys recall, in just the first two verses or verses two and three of chapter one, it says,

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I will utterly consume all from off the earth, says the word land there.

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But the Hebrew word arets could be translated earth. And I feel like that is appropriate, given the context here.

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I will utterly consume all things from off the earth, saith the Lord. I will consume man and beast. I will consume the fowls of the heaven, fishes of the sea, the stumbling blocks with the wicked.

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I will cut off man from off the earth, saith the Lord. And then he goes into talking about Judah and imminent judgment by the hand of the

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Babylonians. He talks about the remnant at the beginning of chapter two. He then flows into talking about the judgment of surrounding nations of Israel.

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You get to chapter three, he goes back to Jerusalem again. And now here we are for the first time since the very opening verses talking about the judgment of the whole world.

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In the Lord's universal judgment on the whole earth, his cup of wrath will be poured out on the nations that he assembles for his indignation, as we learn here.

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The word determination in verse eight is interesting. When we read it in our English translation, we might first assume it's referring to his determination as in predetermination or foreordination, his decree of the events that are about to unfold.

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I mean, that's a given, certainly. However, the word determination here doesn't necessarily refer to that explicitly.

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It's the Hebrew word mishpat, and it's talking about the justice of his actions.

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The word could be translated justice or referring to the act of deciding a case or litigation before judges.

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This is what the Hebrew word means. And so another way you could say it, rather than saying, for my determination is to gather the nations, you could say, for my act of justice is to gather the nations that I may assemble the kingdoms to pour out my indignation upon them.

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So he's saying it is my just action to gather all these nations, gather all these kingdoms, and to pour my wrath upon them, which, you know, obviously his determination, as we know it, is involved as well.

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But the fact that he brings this to light kind of adds some depth to it because, you know, sometimes we think, oh,

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God is just getting angry. You know, he's about to just unleash everything, unleashes wrath. And I mean, that's true.

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But you have to ask, why is that true? Why is it necessary? And it's because of his justice. That is why.

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It's God's just prerogative to gather the nations for wrath by virtue of their complete sin and by virtue of his complete holiness.

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It's something that he simply has to do. And that's what he is bringing to light in verse 8 of our chapter here.

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He rises to the prey. If we look at the progression in this verse,

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I mean, verse 8 is really interesting. Here's a little interesting factoid that I picked up.

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I don't think it means much. I think it's just interesting. But apparently this is the only verse in the entire...

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I know, you can make fun of me later. It's the only verse in the entire Old Testament, according to scholars of the

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Masoretic Hebrew text that our Bible is derived from.

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It's the only single verse in the entire Old Testament that has every letter of the Hebrew alphabet all in one verse.

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Again, not that that means anything. I just thought that was interesting. And it is very,

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I mean, it's packed full of information here. Let's look at the progression. It starts, and it's all in a single verse.

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In verse 8, it says, he rises to the prey. So it starts by saying that he rises to the prey in justice.

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I need to make a note here really quick. A lot of commentators believe that when he says, wait ye upon me until the day

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I rise up to the prey, that what's being referred to here is actually the remnant, that he is rising up to basically gather the prey.

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I suppose the prey referring to those being preyed upon by the nations and the kingdoms of the world.

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I guess that could be a valid interpretation. When I read it, to me, the flow of it makes a lot more sense.

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He's saying, wait ye upon me, because when that day comes, I will rise up to the prey. The Hebrew word for prey there literally is talking about the target of something.

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Well, what's the something? It's his indignation. It's his wrath that follows immediately after.

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And so I think what's happening is when he says, I will rise up to the prey, he's talking about he is rising up to meet his prey, the prey of his wrath.

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I'm not sure. There may be some more reasons as to why a lot of great commentators believe that's a reference to the remnant.

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I'm not exactly sure why, but I do think it makes more sense that he's referring to his prey, the target of his wrath.

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So the progression here, he rises to the prey in justice. It is just for him to do so.

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He gathers the nations and assembles the kingdoms. And again, it says it is his determination to do so.

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It's his righteous act of justice to do this. And then what does he do after he assembles them?

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It says that he pours out his indignation on them. And then what follows after that? All of his fierce anger falls on them.

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And then what happens after that? The earth is devoured with fire, which proceeds from his jealousy.

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All of that is wrapped into that single verse. It's pretty crazy. Now, I want to talk about wrath for just a little bit and look at a few of its uses in the

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New Testament. It's pretty clear what's being talked about right here in Zephaniah 3 .8.

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It's a reference to when he comes in the clouds, when his second coming takes place, the wrath that will follow.

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Of course, this is a reference to the Battle of Armageddon itself. I will gather the nations.

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I will assemble the kingdoms. So that's what Zephaniah 3 .8 is talking about. But of course, it mentions specifically his indignation.

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And so I want to talk about kind of that concept a little bit. His indignation, his wrath and things like this.

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So turn with me to Romans chapter 2, and we're going to look at something kind of interesting, I believe.

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The Apostle Paul, he talks a lot about the wrath of God throughout the

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New Testament. In many cases, when you look at the context, and we're going to look at a couple of these passages as well, by the way, but many times when he's referring to the wrath, he's referring to the eternal judgment, the eternal consequence of sin.

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That being, of course, the punishment of hell ultimately. However, in Romans chapter 2 here, we see him talking about the wrath, talking about the indignation in a different, slightly different context.

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Let's just start at verse 1. We'll read the first few verses here. By the way, chapter 2 begins with a therefore.

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So what was just prior to that? Prior to that, it talks about the entire

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Gentile apostasy, the state of apostasy of essentially the world.

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Basically, he goes through all the sins, being filled with unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, malice, malice, all this kind of stuff.

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He's going all through that, implacable, unmerciful. In verse 32, the very last verse of chapter 1, he ends by saying, "...who,

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knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them."

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So these are the kind of people he's talking about when you get to chapter 2. Therefore, and you can read along with me here, "...thou

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art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest, for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself.

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For thou that judgest doest the same things." He's talking about hypocrites here.

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He's not talking about righteous judging, using God's word as the standard.

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He's talking about hypocritical people that judge to their liking, but do the same things.

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But we are sure, verse 2 says, that the judgment of God is according to truth.

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You notice the contrast there, from hypocrites to God's judgment, which is according to truth, against them which commit such things.

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What things? Well, all of the preceding stuff in chapter 1, but also to the hypocritical judges as well.

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"...and thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God."

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All right, so hone in really, really carefully here. "...that thou shalt escape the judgment of God."

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So far, what could this be referring to? It could be referring to, again, the eternal consequence of sin and the actions that are taking place in chapter 1, that implacable spirit.

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But let's see where Paul takes it. Verse 4 says, "...or despises thou the riches of His goodness in forbearance and long suffering."

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We've been talking a lot about His long -suffering spirit in this study. "...not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance."

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They're missing out on how they could escape all of these egregious acts.

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Verse 5 says, "...but after thy hardness." So repentance is possible, but verse 5 says, "...after

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thy hardness in impotent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath."

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So here's where the concept of wrath starts coming into the picture here. "...against the day of wrath in the revelation of the righteous judgment of God."

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So the key here that differentiates Paul's use of wrath from other uses that other times where he uses the term and the concept of God's wrath, again, we'll look at some of those in a sec, is the day.

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So he, in many cases, he refers to the wrath. In this case, he's specific in referring to the day of God's wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.

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Just consider, just hold in the back of your mind everything we just read in Zephaniah 3 .8.

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Remember that Hebrew word for determination, the just actions of God. And you go to Romans 2 .5,

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the revelation of the righteous judgment of God. But it's in reference to the day of His wrath, not just His wrath in general, but the day of His wrath.

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Verse 6 says, "...who will render to every man according to his deeds." Now, this is interesting because what's going to happen, what's one of the things that will take place when

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Jesus returns? The separation of the sheep from the goats. Verse 6,

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Paul tells us, "...on the day of His wrath, He will render to every man according to His deeds."

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Verse 7 says, "...to them who by patient continuance in well -doing..." What happens here?

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It's another contrast here. "...to them who by patient continuance in well -being seek for glory and honor and immortality."

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Eternal life. When the separation takes place, although I guess you could argue that even prior to the separation, that immortality will be manifested.

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Our glory will be manifested because of the rapture as He is coming back in the clouds.

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But in verse 8, "...and to them that are contentious and do not obey the truth..."

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Think about the disobedience that permeates the book of Zephaniah. "...do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness.

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To them, indignation and wrath." What does Zephaniah 3, 8 say? What does it say?

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"...I will pour upon them my indignation." And then verse 9 says, "...tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the

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Jew first, and also of the Gentile." Now, this is interesting because one of the whole points of Paul, the context of Paul's chapter here, is essentially

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God's impartiality between Jews and Gentiles.

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So he's using it to teach the truth that Gentiles, that God is not impartial, and that Gentiles have every right to salvation, essentially, to the gospel as the

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Jews do. So that's kind of the broad context of what he's talking about here.

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And yet in doing so, he's talking specifically about the day of wrath. And he says when that day comes, or in the context of talking about that day in verse 9, he says, "...tribulation

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and anguish upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first, but also of the

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Gentile." So think about what he just said there. He's saying God is impartial when it comes to His judgment because that indignation will come first to the

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Jew and then to the Gentile. But then in verse 10, and this is the part where we normally focus in on because it's what's great for us, as he says, "...but

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glory, honor, peace to every man that worketh good to the Jew first, then to the

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Gentile. For there is no respect of persons with God." So he's talking about impartiality of God.

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But right in the middle of that, he's using the example of the day of his wrath, which

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I believe is a specific reference to the same event that Zephaniah 3 .8 is talking about, the day of his indignation, which

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Paul mentioned, the day that he pours out his wrath, which Paul mentioned here. And in that day, when he comes and throughout kind of just his judgment in general to those who have hard hearts and do not repent and continue in their wicked ways, the indignation and the wrath will be upon them.

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So that right there, I believe, is an interesting parallel passage of Paul regarding what

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Zephaniah is talking about. But I also want to look at a few other passages, again, where Paul uses the term wrath because, and we've talked about this before, we're going to essentially look at what are some of the biggest proof texts, quote unquote, for those who subscribe to the pre -tribulation rapture and why they believe that is true.

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And it comes back to basically God's wrath. If you turn to Romans chapter 5 now, just skip over a little bit, it says in verse 9, well, let's see here, see what kind of context we should gather.

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Okay, let's start at verse 1 and go down to verse 9, and I want you guys to see if the context seems, feels different than the passage that we just read and like what's really being talked about here in chapter 5.

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Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

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Now, Paul was referencing that in chapter 2 as well, for those who obey, to them glory, immortality, eternal life.

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Here we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Those who are justified, that's kind of the key that I want you guys to keep in mind as we read through those, read through this passage.

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Verse 3 says, and not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience.

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Dad, of course, did an in -depth study of this chapter a while back in that the word tribulation here isn't necessarily referring to the great tribulation.

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It's referring to pressure that is applied to believers during their walk.

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And it's this pressure, as we will learn here in just a second, it says that worketh patience, patience experience, experience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the

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Holy Ghost, which is given unto us. It's that pressure that basically battle tests us for what's to come, all of the various battles that we'll face as believers as we live our lives.

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So it is through justification that we rejoice in the hope of glory.

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But not only that, also, you know, everything you just mentioned, the glory that brings the, or we glory in tribulations that bring the tribulation, that bring patience and experience, and ultimately that hope becomes full circle.

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In verse 6, he says, for when we were yet without strength in due time, Christ died for the ungodly.

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For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die.

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But God commandeth His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

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And then here's the key verse here. Much more than being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.

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Okay, he talks about wrath, he talked about wrath in chapter 2, and he just talked about it again in chapter 5, but what's the difference here?

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The difference in context is that in chapter 5, he's talking about those that are justified, and the results of that justification, the fact that we can glory even through tribulation because the tribulation brings the patience and the experience and eventually the hope.

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But also, because of this justification, we shall be saved, being justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.

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The context here is more broad, but also

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I feel like it carries more of the eternal implications, whereas in chapter 2,

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Paul is talking about the day of His wrath. I believe here he's talking about hell. We are being justified by His blood, we are saved from eternal punishment, the eternal consequence of the sin that we had before He died for our sins.

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Okay, so in many cases when a verse like this would be used as a quote -unquote proof text to say that we are going to be saved from the great tribulation specifically, the context seems makes it very clear that what's being talked about here is the consequence of, the eternal consequence of sin, not the great tribulation per se.

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Now let's look at another one, though, that's kind of similar. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 1, again what

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I'm doing here is I'm trying to differentiate because the concept of wrath is used in a number of different places.

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It's used in our Zephaniah passage, that first Romans passage that we looked at in chapter 2,

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I believe is a parallel to the Zephaniah passage. I believe it's talking about the same day of His indignation, the day of His wrath as Paul put it, where He pours out

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His indignation, His fierce anger. But there are other places where Paul uses wrath, but in a different context.

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Romans chapter 5 was one of them. 1 Thessalonians 1 .10 says, let's see, should

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I start at verse 9 maybe? Verse 9 just says, For they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how we turned to God from idols to serve the living and true

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God. And verse 10 says, And to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, even

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Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come. This is a big one that is used again as a proof text, so to speak, of us being removed from the great tribulation.

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What's interesting is, in the same study of Zephaniah we've done, we've already determined that in a sense we are kind of removed, but we're not removed in the sense of a hyper -dispensationalist secret rapture before the tribulation sense.

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We are removed, as Zephaniah put it, in that we, those that are faithful, those that remain meek and those that remain righteous, will be hid in the day of the

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Lord's wrath. So we will be removed in that sense. We will be hid, well, it has a prerequisite, those that are faithful and meek, those that continue in meekness and righteousness, they will be hid.

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But once again here we can see that in Paul's context he's not referring necessarily to the day of wrath, and that's certainly true.

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Wrath and indignation will be there, will be present on that day. But there is also wrath in the more broad, eternal consequence of sin kind of way, which is what we're delivered from.

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We are delivered from the eternal separation of God that is to come, but in addition to the eternal separation, the eternal punishment and torment, and so on and so forth.

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One more here, 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, just hop over a page, and verse 9, again,

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I want you guys to be thinking about the kind of contextual differences in these passages we're looking at compared to the first passage in Romans that we looked at, where the context is very clear when talking about the day of the

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Lord's wrath and how those that continue in their sin, all of the sins that are mentioned in Romans 1, how they will see or take part in that wrath and in the indignation.

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In 1 Thessalonians 5, 9, it says, well let's start in verse 8 yet again, but let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love for an helmet, the hope of salvation.

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What is that? That is the hope of our eventual redemption, the fullness of our redemption.

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For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our

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Lord Jesus Christ. So again, Paul uses this concept of wrath, he used, he talked about wrath in Romans chapter 2.

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Romans chapter 2, I believe, is talking clearly about not only the Great Tribulation, but more specifically the day of his return when that separation of the wheat and the goats takes place and he pours out the wrath of his indignation that Zephaniah is also talking about.

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But here, what is he talking about? To obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, he is contrasting wrath with salvation.

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What's the antithesis of our eternal salvation? It would be eternal damnation.

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So again, it's talking about eternal consequence of sin, not necessarily the day of wrath, which

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Paul talked about in Romans chapter 2. So there we looked at at least four uses of wrath in the

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New Testament, all from Paul, but using the context of the passages, we can see his use is slightly different in chapter 2 versus those other places that we just looked at.

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He specifically is talking about the day of his wrath that Zephaniah, the prophet, is also telling us about in chapter 3 verse 8.

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But then he goes on in those other passages, Romans 5, 1 Thessalonians 1 and 1 Thessalonians 5, to talk about basically to juxtapose our eternal salvation with the eternal damnation that will also come to those that unfortunately will face his...they'll

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face the day of his wrath for sure, but even after that is over, there is the eternal wrath that is to come as well.

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Okay, so now that we looked at those and I felt like it was appropriate to touch on those by again, virtue of the fact that those are used quite often to prove a pre -trib rapture theory, not so much.

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We can talk about God's wrath and it remained perfectly consistent with the historical pre -millennial view of a post -tribulation wrath or post -tribulation rapture.

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And of course the wrath will follow that, but let's shift back to looking at some parallel passages for just a second on our passage in Zephaniah.

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So again, let me see if I can turn back there. We're actually going to be in Revelation if you want to start turning there, but I wanted to read

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Zephaniah 3 .8 one more time. So now we're looking at parallel passages, in other words, passages just like Romans chapter 2 that we just looked at that are talking about the same event that Zephaniah is talking about.

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Zephaniah 3 .8 one more time says, Therefore wait ye upon me, saith the Lord, until the day that I rise up to the prey, for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them my indignation, even all my fierce anger, for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy.

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Keep that in mind and look at Revelation chapter 6, verse 15, beginning at verse 15.

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It says, And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks,

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Fall on us and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the

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Lamb. One of the most interesting passages, to be sure.

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It almost sounds like an oxymoron. The wrath of the Lamb. You don't typically think of wrath and indignation proceeding from an innocent lamb, but this lamb is different, of course, because this is the resurrected lamb that has already ascended, that is currently sitting on his throne, that bears the scars of his crucifixion, that we learned about, or we actually looked at this a couple of weeks ago,

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I think, in the message. It wasn't Sunday school.

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It was something we did during the main service that talked about the lamb standing as if slain.

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So this is the lamb that is talking about here. They're hiding themselves from the wrath of the

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Lamb. Verse 17 says, For the great day of his wrath, same exact phraseology that Paul uses in Romans 2, the day of his wrath is come, who shall be able to stand?

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Now, interestingly enough, this question, who shall be able to stand, it's a rhetorical question that's asked not only in Revelation, but all throughout the

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Minor Prophets as well. We've looked at one in Obadiah, one in Malachi, one in Zephaniah, or actually not

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Zephaniah, but in Amos, there's another one. We see this question phrased in different ways numerous times, who will stand when that day comes?

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Zephaniah actually gives us an answer to that question, and we studied this like three weeks ago. So, the answer to who can stand that day is who he talks about in chapter 2,

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Seek ye upon the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment, seek righteousness and seek meekness.

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It may be that ye are hid in the day of the Lord's wrath, or of his anger.

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So there is a group of people that will be able to stand and will be able to essentially survive that day, and it's those that continue in meekness and righteousness.

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But we do know the connotation that comes with this rhetorical question in most places is those that are the target, the prey, that Zephaniah talks about, where he rises to the prey, those are the ones who he rhetorically asks who can stand from the wrath that is to come.

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Of course, we know the answer to that is no one will be able to. So it just depends.

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Are you talking about the whole world, or are you talking about the prey, the target of his wrath? If you're talking about that specifically, no one can stand.

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If you're talking about the whole world, who can stand when that day comes, Zephaniah gives us the answer. It's those that continue in meekness and righteousness.

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They will be hid. All right, skip over to chapter 14 in Revelation, and let's look at another parallel passage to our

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Zephaniah verse that we've been reading. Revelation 14 beginning in verse 9 says,

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And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast in his image and receive his mark in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine, the wrath of God, which is poured out, notice the similarities with the wording in Zephaniah, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his what?

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Of his indignation. This is exactly what Zephaniah is talking about in chapter 3 verse 8.

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And he shall be tormented with the fire and with brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the

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Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever.

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And they lay no rest day or night who worship the beast in his image and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.

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In our Malachi study, I believe, or maybe it was the very beginning of Zephaniah, we know it was

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Zephaniah. Zephaniah chapter 1 verse 2 is used as a proof text for the annihilationist crowd that believe that God doesn't actually, he doesn't actually temporally condemn people for all of eternity.

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He just kind of snuffs them out of existence. You know, those who believe on him will have eternal life with him, but those who don't, it's as if they never existed.

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And to them, that's a little bit easier to chew on than the concept or the doctrine of hell as it's traditionally known.

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And yet, Revelation 14, 11 says the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever.

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It'd be interesting to look at the Greek word there, Dad. I don't know if you have

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Blue Letter Bible open, but if you look at forever and ever, I wonder if it's the same aeon ho aeon, meaning age into age, that's in some of those other passages we looked, because that would be...

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So we have a lot of passages we've looked at that talk about God's dominion and glory forever and ever.

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A literal translation would be His dominion and glory unto age and age, essentially.

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Age unto age, perhaps. Here we have the opposite side of that same coin, and it's a devastating one, no doubt, but here it is.

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And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for age unto age, and they have no rest day or night, who worship the beast in his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.

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So these parallel passages, of course, they shed a lot more light on this day of His indignation that is to come that we read about in Zephaniah 3 .8.

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It'll be a direct answer to the sins of the heathen nations, but also, as we learned from Paul in Romans 2, that first parallel passage we looked at, there will be no partiality between ethnic groups, including

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Israel, by the way. And I believe, again, this is referring more broadly to the great tribulation, the judgment that will take place throughout the tribulation leading up to the day of His wrath.

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We know that Paul also tells us later in Romans 11 that all of Israel will be saved when they actually see their

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Messiah coming. But prior to that, there will certainly be, I guess, what we could call unregenerate

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Jews that actually are in unity with the Antichrist.

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So there will be some, and many that die, I presume, during the great tribulation.

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So there's no partiality in His judgment in that regard, because there will be unfaithful Jews that reject

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Christ, who will take part in that judgment. So as Paul tells us, there's no partiality between ethnic groups, including

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Israel, during that time. But rather, there is partiality, as he ends the passage with in verses 10 and 11, between the righteous and the unrighteous.

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So the Jews that are righteous and Gentiles that are righteous, he protects and hides, whereas judgment and eventually the ultimate day of His wrath will come on Jews and Gentiles throughout that great tribulation period that are unrighteous.

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Did you have a thought, Dad? Okay, so I've never noticed that before, but you have the opposite end of that same coin, the reality that their torment will be present throughout the ages to come.

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It's not an annihilationist, snuffing out of existence kind of thing.

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It is, in fact, a conscious eternal torment and judgment for those who reject

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Christ and who hate Him. All right, let's, oh gosh, I guess we'll, I did not intend to only get one verse in, but we used up all of our time.

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So do y 'all have any other thoughts or anything like that? We'll just pick it up at verse nine next week, because I ate up too much time.

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But I think we do have like maybe a minute, if y 'all have any other comments that you would like to make.

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Yeah. Well, oh, in the case of the pre -trib.

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Right, well, and it's, okay, here's a thought. I had this yesterday. Let's, for the sake of argument, say that all of those places we looked at where Paul used the term wrath is talking about the day of his wrath.

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Just for the sake of argument, we're talking with someone who subscribes to the pre -trib rapture theory, and they say, well, see, you know, we are protected from his wrath.

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And that's talking about the day of his wrath, the same day of his wrath that he talks about in Romans chapter two. The day of his wrath is referring to when he returns and begins to separate the sheep from the goats.

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Of course, we'll be protected from that as well, because we will be on the side of the sheep. So, in other words, they presume that wrath is referring to the seven -year tribulation period when in actuality, when

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Paul uses it referring to any part of all of that, he's talking about the day of his wrath, which is when he's coming back in the clouds, like thunder from the east to the west, after the seventh trump, all this kind of stuff.

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So his wrath is reserved for that day. Maybe there are some places there that I haven't found yet, but to my knowledge, there aren't any passages where his wrath is talking about the seven -year tribulation period.

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His judgment will be present for sure, because that's when the vials will be opened and the seals and the trumpets, but every context that wrath is used is either talking about one of two things.

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The day of his second coming, which is what Zephaniah is talking about. It's what John in Revelation was talking about.

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It's what Paul in chapter two of Romans is talking about. So that's one use of the term wrath. The second use of the term wrath, and every other place

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I've seen it, to my knowledge, I've looked in every place that I've found, and to my knowledge, there's no other place is what

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I'm trying to say here, where the use of the word wrath is talking about eternal punishment. I have never seen one where it's talking about the seven -year tribulation period specifically.

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So even for the sake of argument, if you wanted to say all of those passages referred to the day of his wrath, they would have to be referring to the day of his second coming, not the seven -year tribulation period.

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Yes, ma 'am? I don't have my glasses with me, so I can't look anything up, but isn't there a scripture that talks about us being called out for the last time?

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It's probably Revelation chapter seven. Oh, okay.

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In 1 Corinthians 15. Yeah. Yeah.

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Yes, Mamie. This lesson wasn't meant to get into the proof passages of a post -trib rapture.

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That's what you're referring to. And in Thessalonians, we will not prevent them is the old

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English word, it means proceed, that they have to be raised first. And Paul was, what's amazing about it is, the whole point

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Paul even brings that up is he's just reassuring those in Thessalonica that don't worry your loved ones that went before us, they're not missing anything.

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In fact, we are not even going to precede them in the rapture until they come up first and are glorified.

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So there is that for sure. And then 1 Corinthians 15, it talks about the last trump and the chronology.

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You know, if you look at it, we're not going to be, the first resurrection won't happen until after the last trump.

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And then Paul tells us another place, we can't proceed the first resurrection. So, you know, yes, those are a couple of really good, really good places to go when it comes to, you know, figuring out the timing of things.

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All righty, guys, is that it for today? I will go into this one. And Dave, if you don't mind, you could dismiss this in prayer.

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Father, Heavenly Father, we thank you for your mercy and your grace.

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Father, we also thank you that you display wrath towards your enemies.

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We also thank you, Father, that those enemies are our enemies. Father, help us to act more like that.

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As if they are against you, and therefore we are in contrast to them as well.

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Father, help us to align ourselves with you. Help us to be more in tune with your word.

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And Father, we ask that you help us to do so in love, in weakness, in humility, with the people around us.

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And Father, please give repentance to those that don't know you, to love you, to Jesus in your assistance.