The Path to Forgiveness: Embracing God's Grace

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast

where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh and I want to thank you for listening to

this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen

you in the word of God.

Now come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has

for us here today.

For these are the people that believe that they are the good ones,

they are the religious ones.

And he talks about their double minded ways, he talks about

their hypocrisy, he talks about the false teaching within their

midst.

He talks about folks that were trusting in their riches, they were

trusting in their material blessings and not in the power of

God, not in the hand of God.

And so therefore he's challenging them on this.

He's speaking the truth to them.

And so he's using Zephaniah as his mouthpiece to preach forth the

word of God.

And so there's this judgment in the area of sin.

Now the good news is, is that even in the Old Testament, as God

presents his condemnation, he also presents grace.

He also presents a path to restoration with him.

And so we're going to see here in the book of Zephaniah that God

extends a path for the nation of Israel to have that restoration.

Now what I believe that chapter three is talking about is

the complete restoration that will happen in the future that is

to come.

But still, I think that there are some principles that we can learn

here about restoration with the Lord here, even in our own lives.

When it comes to our salvation, the Bible very clearly

teaches that before we come to Christ, we are what we would call

unsaved.

Now what does that mean, to be unsaved?

That means to be at enmity with God, enemies of God.

Therefore we deserve.

What do we deserve?

Romans, chapter 6, verse 23 says, for the wages or the payment

Romans 6:23

of sin is death.

Right?

And so theologically speaking, you could say it a couple different

ways.

You could say, number one, we don't deserve anything except for

death.

And so the only thing that we actually do deserve within our own

selves is death, punishment, condemnation, separation from God.

But the second part of that verse, but the gift of God is eternal

life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

And so there's this extension of grace, there's this extension

of restoration to those who believe in Jesus Christ, to those

that humble themselves and come to the Lord in faith.

That's exactly what's happening here in the idea of the

nation of Israel, specifically Jerusalem, Judea, God saying, come

back to me in humility, come back to me in faith, and I will restore

you.

I will forgive you, I will embrace you.

If you go back to Zephaniah, chapter one and two, he's.

He's specifically talking about their pride.

And he says, it's because of your pride that you have separated

yourselves.

Chapter two, verse three says, seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of

the earth which hath wrought his judgment.

Seek righteousness, seek meekness.

It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord's anger.

Meaning you want forgiveness.

You must come to God in humility.

And in that humility comes our faith.

We're not going to trust in God.

We're not going to believe that he is a rewarder of those that

diligently seek him, if we're coming to him in pride.

And so therefore, it is that humility that brings us.

It's that godly sorrow that brings us to repentance, that brings

us to faith.

And so that's what we're seeing here as Zephaniah is explaining

this.

And so we get to chapter three, and most of chapter two was

about the judgment of the nations around Judah, around Jerusalem.

But then we see verse one in chapter three.

This is where we left off last time.

We went from three, verse one to verse eight.

But verse one, he says, woe to her that is filthy and polluted to

the oppressing city.

Now, if you just read that and you didn't know the context of who

he's talking to, most of us would say, if you had any grip of

the culture of that day, you would say he's talking about Nineveh,

or he's talking about those Philistine cities.

No, God is speaking of Jerusalem here.

He's speaking of the capital city.

He's speaking of the centerpiece of their worship to him.

And so he goes on to explain, she obeyed not the voice, she received

not correction.

She trusted not in the Lord.

She drew not near to her God.

And so his condemnation really boils down to what verse number two

says.

He says they're filthy.

He says that they're polluted.

He says that they're oppressing.

But why?

Well, because they didn't receive correction.

They didn't obey the voice of God.

They didn't trust in the Lord, they didn't draw near to God.

And so therefore what we can see is the condemnation is not, hey,

you're just evil people.

He's saying, this is how you got to this place of evil in your

nation.

And so he goes down.

And he talks about all those different elements of that.

And then in verse 8 is where we left off.

He says, therefore.

And so the condemnation all the way up to verse number seven.

And then you see verse eight, he 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 mine indignation, even as all my

fierce anger.

And so this shows that God does exercise and will exercise his

righteous anger, his righteous indignation against those that are

rebelling against him.

And so he says, for all the earth shall be devoured with the

fire of my jealousy.

And so we see that in light of the repeated sin of the nations of

the world and God's own people, God would bring judgment.

So there's this promise of judgment.

And so I think a lot of times we leave that out of the message

of the truth of God.

And the reason why sometimes we want to leave out judgment, because

that's kind of scary.

And that seems to some people, hey, that that's not fair that God

would judge those who, you know, they're, they're, they're good

people.

They're trying to do well in their life.

They're trying to do the right things.

So why would God judge those that are in sin?

Well, the Bible says that he does this out of his holiness.

And so there's this righteous indignation that he has against those

that are in sin.

And it says God would bring judgment.

But we also know that verse number nine.

For then will I turn to the people of a pure language that they

may all call upon the name of the Lord to serve him with one consent

or with one accord.

And so, yes, there is the promise of judgment, but there also

is the promise of restoration.

There is the extension of that restoration that he does.

And we can even see that in many of the New Testament passages

that we talk about with salvation, therefore, by grace, are

you saved through faith and that not of yourselves.

It is the gift of God, not of works of.

So a lot of times we think about our salvation, our restoration,

our forgiveness.

It's all based in what we do, and it's not based in what we do

as much as in what we believe in.

And we're believing in the good work of God and the gift of

grace that he's extending to us.

And so, like, say, for example, tonight, I say, okay, everybody

that goes out tonight, there's a gift out there in the lobby for

you.

It's it's given to you.

You didn't do anything for it.

You didn't earn it.

Maybe even some of you might have said some mean things to me

when you came in.

None of you did.

Okay, but let's say you did.

I said, I don't care if you're mean to me.

I don't care if you like me.

I don't care anything.

I don't care if you're a member of Middletown Baptist Church.

If you walk out tonight, there's a gift out there waiting

for you.

All you have to do is receive it.

Now, most of us would say, okay, well, that's great.

I'm gonna go get that gift, right?

I didn't.

I don't pay for it.

What if you got back there and we said, okay, well, this is a gift,

but there's a small price.

You have to pay $5 and you can get the gift.

Well, then you would say, wait, wait, that's not a gift.

I'm buying this for $5.

Even if it's at a discounted rate, I'm still buying it.

So.

Okay, well.

Well, you don't have to buy it, but all you have to do is come

up to Middletown Baptist Church, and all you got to do is

serve five hours in some type of service project, and then you

can get this gift.

You're.

Wait, wait, wait.

That's not a gift that I'm.

I'm earning, that I'm working for that.

And so.

And then some of us might walk out and say, you know what?

Not interested in the gift.

I don't need it.

I don't want it.

I got everything that I need at home.

Right?

You see, all of those things are wrong ways to deal with the gift

of God.

We have to understand that it's freely extended to us.

But then, yes, we have to receive it in faith.

We have to believe it.

And so that comes down to the restoration process.

We have to trust in God's word.

It's not a work of our own.

It's the work of God.

And so this restoration is a work of God.

And so I love that in verse number eight, really, starting from

verse number eight down, he says that they all will call upon

the name of the Lord, that they may all call upon the name of

the Lord, all the nations of the world to serve him with one consent.

And so in this ultimate restoration, even in verse nine,

we see, for then will I turn to the people of pure language.

Now, a lot of people have some arguments about what this pure Language

is, but ultimately we see is there's this unification.

They're all speaking one language, praising God.

So that's why I believe that really, ultimately Zephaniah3 is

talking about that, that end, that millennial kingdom, that time

in which we are all praising God in one language, in one unit.

And the entire world will worship the Lord, not just Israel

at that point.

And so, like I said, most biblical scholars believe that this

is going to be completely fulfilled in the millennium when

Jesus reigns for a thousand years over the earth.

But, but ultimately we can see that there's still principles here

that we can glean.

So literally when it says, there I was, I was reading up what

that means there to serve him with one consent or with one accord,

that that literally means it's.

It's done with one shoulder.

The idea here is that we would be shoulder to shoulder, working

together as one, as we bear the load of this.

This opportunity.

And so we're seeing that there in verse nine, to serve him with

one accord.

Now, ultimately, we know that that's God's will for us right now,

right?

The Bible speaks of in the New Testament, in the Book of Acts and

other places that we are to serve God with one accord.

And that's literally yoking up together, that's linking together

and going shoulder to shoulder and serving God.

So we see that in this restoration, there's blessings.

There's blessings of being able to be used by God, but there's

also blessings of working together with other believers.

And he goes on further.

He says, verse 10.

From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, my suppliants, even the

daughter of my.

My dispersal shall bring mine offering in that day.

Shalt thou not be ashamed for all of thy doings.

He.

He goes on to speak more about this idea of pride.

He says, thou has transgressed against me.

So He.

He acknowledges the sin.

For then I will take away out of the midst of Thee them that rejoice

in thy pride, and thou shalt no more be haughty because of my

holy mountain.

And so he's speaking of this ultimate restoration.

And what we can see here is that there isn't pride in this.

There's no pride in this.

Under the leadership of God, specifically the Lord Jesus and his

redeemed people, the believers here will know what our standing

is before God.

Meaning this.

None of us at that point will ever be tempted to think that it

was because of us.

When this restoration happens, when, when we're ultimately reunited

with our Savior and we're all standing there with all the saints

in glory, there's not going to be a time where we go, you know what?

I was a really, really good Christian.

I earned this.

No, we're.

We're going to be so in awe of the power of God that our haughty

spirit, our prideful spirit will be erased.

Now we know that when we're in glory, there's no longer sin nature.

And I've often thought about that a lot.

I've often thought about how.

How I will live my life without that draw to go towards something

negative, that draw to go back to pride.

Because none of us, hopefully, we don't want to live in pride.

But that's all we do know.

All we do know is falling back into that flesh.

And so at this point, you see, he says, I'm going to remove that

pride, and then there's not going to be a haughty spirit there.

There's not going to be a prideful spirit.

And so I think that the challenge for us is not to wait to

that point to get to that place of, hey, you know what?

This is nothing that I did.

This is.

This is, you know, if.

If we need to try to bring forth our credentials to other Christians

and say, well, look how much I have grown, look how much I have

done, look how great I am as a Christian, that's the point where

we've missed the point because all of us are beggars.

All of us really don't deserve a seat at the table.

There's this wonderful story in, In.

In the Old Testament with David and Jonathan's son, Mephibosheth.

That's a hard word to say.

And David brings Mephibosheth into the table and says, you can

be a part of this, even though Mephibosheth was not really rightful

to be there.

He says, hey, you can come in because of my love for you.

And that's exactly what it is.

I mean, you could picture a table.

And I remember growing up, we always had the kids table.

Thanksgiving, we would.

There would be the adult table, and that would.

That would look like the fun table, right?

And then there was the kids table.

I had to sit at the kids table.

And as I got older, I.

I always wanted to move up and graduate to the adult table.

And I think it was somewhere in my teens.

They said, okay, you come sit at the table and move away from the.

The little ones.

And then once I got to the adult table, I started realizing

that these conversations aren't that impressive.

They're talking about their Retirement, they're talking about

the doctor's appointments and I'm like, I want to go back to the

kids table.

That was more fun.

But, but the point is, is like there, there's a seat at the table

for us.

And the only reason that we're able to come to the table is because

of the grace that's been extended to us.

And so God is offering us that, but we don't deserve it.

And so when we think about it from that perspective and the Philippians

2 perspective, right, Jesus is the one who has every right to live

in pride.

If anyone could live in a prideful way, it was Jesus, right?

He was sinless, could have done whatever he wanted to do, but

yet the Bible says in Philippians chapter two, he took

the form of a servant, right?

We know that he humbled himself.

And we even know that that was manifested at John 3, John 13, when

Jesus washes the disciples feet.

And you all know that story.

And so what we can see here is that there will be no reason to exercise

any prideful thoughts, any prideful actions, because it will

be so clear why we are there.

And I believe that's why that when we receive those crowns and

when we receive those blessings, that we'll turn it back

and say, well, the only reason that I was able to have any of this

is because of what Jesus Christ did for me.

And that, that's hard thing to think about, but really we're gonna

see it from that perspective one day.

And so we'll see more here.

We, we see that there is this destruction of pride.

But then we'll move a little bit further to the element of building

peace.

Verse 12 I will also leave in the midst of the afflicted and poor

people.

And they shall trust in the name of the Lord, the remnant of

Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies.

Neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth.

For they shall feed and lie down and none shall make them afraid.

And so this speaks of peace, speaks of prosperity.

And so in the restoration, ultimately there's a destruction

of pride and an elevation of peace and prosperity.

Now, not false peace and prosperity, right?

There's a way that we can manufacture things to make things

look prosperous and peaceful.

But the Bible says very clearly that that peace cannot come

from any wisdom of man.

And a lot of people, you'll hear this phrase a lot prosperity

gospel, right?

Maybe you've heard that before, maybe you've heard people

say prosperity gospel, maybe you have different viewpoints of

what that even is.

Prosperity gospel as it is in this world today is a false teaching.

I just want to tell you that prosperity gospel is, hey, you know

what?

If you keep pouring into God, he's going to keep pouring to you

materially, and you're just going to have every blessing that

you ever want.

All you got to do is just.

It's word of faith, just speak it out into existence and it'll happen.

The problem with that is that's nothing.

Nothing in scripture speaks of that.

The Bible does, though, speak of a prosperity gospel.

You're like, whoa, what?

Well, it's biblical spiritual prosperity that God brings to us.

You don't believe that.

Read the book of Ephesians.

And the book of Ephesians is all about the spiritual riches that

you have in Christ.

I remember growing up, I would ask my parents, are we rich?

I and my mom and dad would always look at me and they would

go, yeah, we're rich.

And I'm like, really?

Because my friends at school said, they're rich.

And like, how are we rich?

Because, I mean, I don't know.

And they're like, well, we're not rich in money.

We're rich in love.

We're rich in blessings from God.

And I was like, what are they talking about?

That's not rich.

But as I got older, I start to understand that.

And I remember it wasn't too long ago one of our kids asked, hey,

dad, are we rich?

And I'm like, yes, I can use the line, I'm ready to do it.

I was prepared for that.

It was a Christian.

Prosperity is not defined by material blessings.

Now we can't have material blessings.

God materially blesses us.

Every good gift.

James 1:17.

James 1:17

Every good gift comes down from God, right?

So yes, he can bless us, and he will bless us in certain areas

of our material blessings.

But that's not the end all be all.

It's the spiritual prosperity.

So that every Christian in this world can literally, biblically

say, yes, I am rich.

I am prosperous in the blessings of God.

No matter if you have a mansion or a shack, the Bible says,

spiritually speaking, we are prosperous.

And there's a whole study that you can do in the book of Joshua,

Joshua, chapter one.

It speaks of what scriptural success really is.

What is scriptural prosperity?

And that is to obey God's word, to follow him, to love him,

and to grow in that understanding of it.

And so what I would encourage you to do is think about those many

blessings and the peace and the prosperity that can come from

having a relationship with God.

And so we see that there in verse number 13, it says, the remnant

of Israel shall not do iniquity.

I mean, that's beautiful.

There's no more sin nor speak lies, neither shall a deceitful tongue

be found in their mouth, for they shall feed and lie down, and

none shall make them afraid.

So again, this speaks of the peace and prosperity Israel specifically

will know in the millennial kingdom, but also for all of us to

understand one day that that is the ultimate goal of God, to remove

all of these things from our life and give us that peace.

And so I think that that's something that we should long for

even now, because, right.

Heaven is.

Heaven is just perfection.

But we know that God has challenged us to live Christ like

now, to live with the heavenly perspective.

Now, if you have not read this book, it's called, I think it's just

called Heaven by Randy Alcorn, I would.

If you like to read, I'm sure it's in some audio form that you

can do an audio book.

I would encourage you to read that book.

I'm not going to say that I agree with every little thing that

Randy Alcorn says, but what I will say is that it's a wonderful

book that specifically speaks of all the blessings that scripture

says about heaven.

And a lot of times as Christians, all you know about heaven,

all I know about heaven as well.

I know we're going to be there forever, and I know that we're going

to be worshiping God forever.

And does that mean I'm just sitting on a cloud and playing a

harp and singing the same song over and over again?

It's such, we as Christians have such a minute view of what the

Bible actually says about heaven.

And I think it was probably four or five years ago I did a whole

Sunday night series on that book.

So I would encourage you, if you have time, read through that

book.

But it'll give you that heavenly perspective that you can

long for and that actually now you can live with in your own life

to think that way, to direct your mind to that ultimate restoration

that we have with Christ, because we know that Romans chapter

Romans 8:1

8, verse 1, says, there's therefore now no condemnation.

So if you were a believer in Jesus Christ, that step of restoration

has already happened in the concept of your salvation.

Positionally, there's no more condemnation in your life.

God doesn't come back to you and say, well, you know what?

Now that you've sinned, I'm going to take back that deal.

Right?

The gifts at the door and you guys leave.

But then, you know, maybe you guys say something on the Internet

and I go, hey, you know what?

As a Middletown Baptist person, you can't be doing that.

So we're going to take your gift back.

God doesn't do that.

That's an extension of grace.

There's that eternal security.

But we do know that not.

Not losing our salvation, but we do know that we can lose that

fellowship with God if we are living in sin.

Right?

And I've given you that analogy over and over again about

that concept that God doesn't leave us.

But when we are in sin and therefore not walking in fellowship

with him, we have.

We have turned our backs against the Lord.

We have turned our eyes away from Him.

And if you go back, what Does Zephaniah chapter 2 say?

Zephaniah 2 · chapter mention

Seek ye the Lord.

When you're seeking the other things, you're not seeking after

him.

And so therefore you've turned your eyes away from him.

Even I believe it's Colossians, chapter three, Seek ye

the things which are above.

Right?

So it's.

That does God always wants our heart.

I used to think that.

Well, it's all about my actions.

If I do my devotions every day, if I read my Bible, if I pray

every day, everything's going to be okay.

But I have in my life.

I don't know about you, I'm not going to judge you.

I will judge myself.

Though I have been.

I've.

I've gotten up in the morning, read my Bible, I've prayed my prayers,

I've gone to church, I've done everything that I should do on paper,

but yet my heart is a million miles away from walking in fellowship

with the Lord.

Because it's a disassociation of the actions to the heart.

If our heart is where it needs to be, our actions will be there.

But what we all know is that we can go through the motions.

And so Israel, no doubt at this point in time, was worshiping

God in their way that they wanted to worship him, but there

was empty worship.

God always desires our heart.

And so God wants them to seek after him.

And so going forward here, you know, you can go from verse 14 all

the way down to the end of the chapter.

And we see that that restoration brings something to them.

It so.

So the restoration produces something in their life.

Says verse 14.

Sing, O daughter of Zion.

Shout, O Israel, be glad and rejoice with all the heart, O daughter

of Jerusalem.

So the outpouring of this blessing of restoration is what?

Well, they Sing, they shout, they're glad, and they rejoice with

all of their heart.

So.

So this is a product of knowing and believing and really

living in that hope of restoration.

I hope that you don't become a believer.

Who says, you know what?

I don't have a reason to be happy today.

I don't have a reason to rejoice.

I love that the Bible says, make a joyful noise.

It doesn't say, make a noise that's in tune and perfectly in key.

It says, make a joyful noise.

Now, if you can sing in key, do your best for God.

But the Bible does say that we have an opportunity to sing, and

we have a reason to sing.

One of the things that I try sometimes it's a little bit annoying

in the mornings with my kids and the rest of my family, I like

to sing Christian songs when we're waking up in the morning.

So, like, kids are getting ready for school, and they're, like,

walking around like zombies.

And I'm singing songs, right?

And, you know, maybe there's days where I don't feel like singing

either, but I want my children to see that there's joy in my heart.

Like, I have a reason to sing today.

And I'm not in tune.

I'm probably annoying to them.

But the idea is for.

For.

For me is I.

I want people to know that I have a reason to be joyful.

I have a reason to sing.

Now, there are days where I don't always feel that, but what

I will say is that as a Christian, when we have set our heart

on the things of God, we have a reason to rejoice.

We have a reason to be glad.

Verse 15.

The Lord hath taken away thy judgments.

There it is.

That's your reason to rejoice, right?

He's taken away your judgments, and he have cast out thine

enemy.

The enemy is defeated.

Like.

Like we sometimes think, and none of us probably ever want to

admit this, but there's probably times in your life where

you feel, hey, it looks like the enemy's winning.

And ultimately, we know that our ultimate enemy is Satan.

But even sometimes, we think, like another person in our life might

be our enemy.

But the Bible says that that enemy is already defeated.

Jesus defeated the enemy when he died on the cross and conquered

death through the resurrection.

Now the enemy is fighting his best to try to thwart that plan.

But we know that ultimately God is victorious.

And so our judgments have been taken away.

We've been forgiven.

He has cast out thine enemy, and the king of Israel, even the

Lord is in the midst of thee.

So it's.

So here's.

Here's your reasons to be thankful.

You've been forgiven.

The enemy's been defeated, and then what?

The king of Israel, even the Lord is in the midst of the.

The presence of God, your Savior.

You are one with your Savior.

That's what he's saying here.

Thou shalt not see evil anymore in that day.

It shall be said to Jerusalem, fear thou not, and to Zion, let not

thine hands be slack.

The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty.

He will save.

He will rejoice over thee with joy.

You see that?

Not that they would rejoice over him, which they will, but what

does it say there?

It says that he will rejoice over thee with joy.

So not only are we rejoicing, but he's rejoicing in this.

This is a beautiful picture here.

This is.

This is the consummation of everything.

This is the conclusion of all of the struggles of this world.

This is all of the redemptive plan being played out from the very

beginning, all the way to the very end.

This is it.

He says there's going to be rejoicing.

He will rest in his love.

He will joy over thee with singing.

I will gather them that are sorrowful for the solemn assembly

who are of thee to whom the reproach of it was burdened.

Behold, at that time I will undo all that afflicted.

I will save her that halteth and gather her that was driven out.

I will get them praise and fame in every land where they have

been put to shame.

At that time I will bring you again, even in the time that I gather

you.

For I will make you a name and a praise among all the people of

the earth when I turn back your captivity before your eyes,

saith the Lord, a lot of beautiful things there.

There's a lot to talk about, but this passage gives us definite

steps for this constellation.

As we understand it.

God is in our midst.

The Lord is in our midst, and he's saving.

God gives us joy.

God is joyful in that relationship.

He gives us rest.

He sings over us.

And we.

We often.

I, I, at least for me, I don't.

I don't want to put this on you, but I'm talking for myself.

We often underestimate the joy that God has in his people.

Sometimes I, you know, you know the theological truth that,

hey, you know, when someone's saved, you know, all of heaven rejoices.

But you ever thought that, like as you please, the Lord.

He's actually joyful in what we do for Him.

That's.

That's a.

That's a very interesting concept to think about.

I used to think that God would sit up in heaven and just be irritated

with me.

Again, this is the hundredth time you've messed up.

And though I certainly know that we can grieve the Holy Spirit

by the way that we live, I think all the more God is so joyful

as, as our loving Father is when his child does something for

the good that, that obeys Him.

You know, like, I will love my children no matter what.

I will never.

I will not agree with everything that they do, but I will

always love my children.

But all of you that are parents understand that joy and that

blessing when your child does something in obedience or does something

out of kindness, and you're like, wow, that's an amazing thing

to see.

Um, that's the emotion that God has when we obey him, that we.

When we serve him, when we are restored to Him.

And so we often don't think about it from that perspective.

And so we know that God has a tender love for us.

We know that although he's all powerful, he's all knowing, he's

all present, he's also personal.

And that's something that I find so unique and so beautiful.

When it comes to this understanding that we have a God,

there's.

I'm going to tell you two words here tonight.

We have a God who is transcendent, meaning he's not bound

by our world.

He's not bound by time.

He's not bound by space.

Like we are right?

Time goes by and we can't slow it down or we can't speed it up.

Growing up, when I was in school, a day at school felt like

an eternity.

I was like, I want to speed this up to get home.

And I would sit there and it was just like, when is this ever

going to stop?

And.

And now it's like, it's already Friday.

I just feel like the week started.

And so either way, we cannot do that.

We can't adjust the time that's around us.

But God is transcendence, meaning He's.

He's not bound by that.

But we also know that God is imminent in the concept that he is

personal, that he's with us.

He's not a clock maker that steps aside and says, okay, you guys

figured out, I'll.

I'll pop in every few thousand years just to help.

You know, we have a God who wants that personal relationship

with us.

And that's a.

That's a wonderful thing to know what we have when it comes to

our relationship with God.

So God promised to encourage those that were discouraged.

I don't know about you, but that's something that helps me understand.

The love of God is that he encourages us in the midst of our

discouragement.

I don't know what discourages you, but it doesn't matter what discourages

you.

God is the One who's the encourager.

He's the One who fights our battles for us.

He's the One that heals the sick.

He's the One who gathers those that have gone astray.

All of this.

All of this for his glory.

And we are the beneficiaries of that.

And the reason why we're the beneficiaries of that is because

of our faith in him and our trust in what he has done.

And so, yes, there's that judgment.

The book of Zephaniah is all about that.

Calling out sin for sin, changing our path.

Repentance.

We talked about biblical repentance, but there's also that

restoration.

There's the restoration of Israel right here.

But I believe, too, also, and in a more personal way, that God

is extending that gift of restoration to all of us in this

world.

And we only have so much time.

We don't know.

The Bible does say redeem the time.

We don't know when God is going to say, okay, that's enough.

Judgment is coming.

But all we can do is do our part in the time that we have.

Tomorrow is not guaranteed.

And I'm not just talking about, you know, the end of the world,

but tomorrow's not guaranteed for me.

Right?

And I know that life is but a vapor, and therefore I should be

doing what I can to honor and glorify Him.

And so one of the things that I have struggled with in my own life

has been having that perspective of the eternal.

Like, I'm so stuck in my problems of the day that I don't

see the bigger picture in the goodness of God in His victory.

And I'll tell you, it actually sometimes takes a situation in your

life to kind of put you into a different framework of mine.

So I will tell you, actually, two events that happened last year

really helped me with that.

So I don't know how many of you were here.

I think it was actually two summers ago, but we had a car accident.

And I, you know, I'm not saying that God works this way with

everybody, okay?

But I do believe that God uses circumstances to get our attention.

So we had a car accident.

And I remember in that moment realizing all those things that I

was str.

It was a Sunday night, and I don't know if you guys know this

or not.

Sundays are pretty stressful for pastors.

Okay?

We wake up in the morning thinking about all the things that

should go right and then all the things that could go wrong.

Sundays are difficult, right?

And it's.

It's our.

It's our work day.

Um, and some people say it's your only day of the week.

Like, you work an hour a week.

Come on, what's going on?

No, but Sundays are the culmination of everything in the

week.

Um, and so after a stressful day, I had a lot on my mind.

And we're driving, and all of a sudden, when that We.

We flipped the car, and I remember thinking, none of that matters.

Like, all that stuff I was stressed about today, about whether

this is going to run right or this is going to go well, that.

That silly stuff didn't even matter.

The only thing that mattered in that moment, obviously, was my

life.

And my life was in the hands of the Lord at that point and my

children's lives.

And so there was that.

And, you know, you would think that that would be enough to wake

you up, but of course, you know, you get back into that pitfall

of like, oh, man, there's so much stress going on.

I got to make sure this.

And then many.

Most of you know, in January of last year, Silas was born.

And.

And I do remember in that moment, and I'll try not to go too

personal here tonight, but when.

When I was driving from one hospital to the other hospital, I.

I had a.

The first.

I'm not gonna say the first.

The.

The first conversation in a long time with God that was so authentically

real.

I can tell you, a lot of my prayers are like, okay, I gotta make

sure.

I have to word this just right.

I have to make sure I do all the sayings.

And then there was that moment when I was driving from one hospital

to the other, and Silas was taken away from us, and we were.

Didn't know what was going to happen.

There was surgery coming.

I remember having a real conversation with the Lord, and it

was.

It wasn't disrespectful, but it was like, lord, I need you.

I can't do anything without you.

And in that process of waiting, in that process of seeing

that go through, I remember really that that put things into

perspective for me.

And so there's things in our life that I think God allows to happen

so that we can see the perspective of the eternal, like

what really matters in this world.

And so many times we get caught up with things that don't

matter.

So many times we get caught up with things that really, though they

might be significant in that moment, are not eternally significant.

So therefore, what we have to do is we have to allow ourselves

to come to the word of God and allow ourselves to see what really

truly matters.

And what I can tell you that matters is the eternal perspective

is all about the Great Commission winning souls to Christ,

discipling folks, creating disciples.

And I will tell you this.

If there.

There's really three things I want you to think about here this

evening, and then we're going to close.

One is you have to be a believer.

That's the.

You can't have any of his hope without faith in Jesus Christ, right?

We understand that.

But secondarily, to be a believer that's growing, we have

to be what the Bible calls as a disciple.

A disciple is someone who is a dedicated learner of Christ.

That that not is not just a casual Christian, but someone who

is committed to the cause of the Gospel.

But then also the Bible says it's not just enough to be a disciple,

but naturally, or let me say it this way, supernaturally, disciples

make disciples, right?

Look at all the examples in the New Testament.

Those that were the disciples of Christ, they were commissioned

to make disciples for Christ.

Now, it's not the power of the disciple that makes another person

a disciple, but we teach them.

That's what the Great Commission says, to teach them what

it means to observe those things which God has commanded us.

So I say all that to say that's what matters.

Eternally coming to Christ, growing in our spiritual walk, leading

other people to that same spiritual walk, and being able to

live for that kingdom, live for the eternal.

And that's what matters.

And there's a lot of things that fall under that.

There's a lot of things that fall under that.

But are we those people that are described there in Zephaniah,

Chapter one, false teachers, hypocrites, focused on the material,

focused on their money, focused on their position.

Are we ones that are seeking after the Lord?

So I would say, if you were going to take one verse in Zephaniah,

I would say, take Zephaniah, chapter two, verse three.

Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth which have wrought his

judgment.

Seek righteousness, seek meekness, it may be ye shall be hid

in the day of the Lord's anger.

And so that's the idea, I think, of the Book of Zephaniah.

So there is reproof, but there also is restoration.

And I pray that that's something that you can come to in

your life when it comes to that idea of evaluation.

Where am I standing before God?

Is God reproving me?

Is he condemning me for what I'm doing?

Well, there's not condemnation anymore, so you can answer that question

with a definitive yes, he's not condemning me for my sin.

But we do know 2 Timothy 3:16 says that Scripture is there to not

2 Timothy 3:16

only show us what to believe, but also to reprove us, to correct

us.

And so there is that time where God, where a loving Father

corrects us and changes us, hopefully for the good.

So, anyway, I'll go ahead and conclude there that Zephaniah, the

Book of Zephaniah, three chapters, short book of the Bible,

not often talked about.

But I would say that it's been an enjoyable study for me and I hope

that in some ways it's helped you in your spiritual walk.

I know that some people were wondering what our next study is

going to be.

For the next few Wednesday nights.

We are going to be at least till the end of the year and maybe

even a little bit into the new year, we're going to be just going

through a study on biblical words.

And if for some of you that do follow our podcast, we do a word

of the week every week.

And so it's going to be like an extended version of that.

And we're going to talk about different biblical words that you

may be familiar with or maybe you're not so familiar with.

Maybe you've heard, but maybe you haven't completely understood

or maybe not completely seen what it's talked about in scripture

about that word.

And we'll talk about that.

So encourage you to come back.

I will do probably, I would say probably four or five of those.

And then we'll get back into a book study coming up here in the

new year.

So appreciate your faithfulness and these studies together.

Let's go ahead and transition to our prayer time.

If you have a prayer sheet, go ahead and get those out.

If you need one, we'll have some of those being distributed for

you.

Just slip your hand up in there and we'll get that to you.

Pastor's prayer for 2024 can you believe that?

We're almost done with 2024.

I felt like 2024 just started and now we're getting to the end.

And so I encourage you to look through that and be praying.

We'd be praying this year in 25 for a couple of different things.

We're going to be really, really trying to launch some interesting

things at the church when it comes to the area of reaching our

community, reaching our state, reaching our nation, and reaching

our world.

And you might say, well, what's that all about?

Well, Acts chapter 1, verse 8 tells us very clearly to go to Jerusalem,

Acts 1:8

Judea, Sumeria, into the outermost part of the earth.

Next year we're going to be sharing with you different ways that

you can be a part of all of those.

Not literally Jerusalem, unless that's laid upon your heart,

but our local area, our surrounding areas, to difficult areas

and to the uttermost part of the earth.

And so I'm excited for that.

Just be praying.

I know that's kind of cryptic, but we're trying.

We're going to, we're going to get there in January on praises.

We're just thankful for all the things that God's doing at our

church, thankful for the blessings that he's been sending

our way, and thankful for what he's doing spiritually in our midst.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church

podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been.

A blessing for you.

You.

If you would like to find out.

More information about our church or this sermon, you can find

us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find

us on Facebook or YouTube.

You can also email me directly at Josh Massaroiddletownbaptistchurch

dot com if you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and follow

along for future podcast and updates.

Thank you so much.

God bless.

Have a wonderful day.