Unveiling Zephaniah: A Journey Through Judgment and Hope

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.

All right, let's go ahead and get our bibles out.

We're going to start our Bible study here this evening.

We just got done with a very well known book of the Bible, the

Book of Ruth.

And if you were here for that study, I hope that it was a blessing

for you.

If you got parts, bits and pieces of that, hopefully it was

encouraging for you.

If you missed it, I encourage you to go back.

Thankfully, with the advent of the Internet and all that, you can

go back and watch those.

And I encourage you to go back if you missed any of those and study

through that book of the Bible.

So we have books of the Bible that we're very familiar with.

Ruth is one that a lot of people are familiar with.

You've got other books of the Bible that people talk about all

the time, but we've also got books of the Bible that aren't mentioned

a lot.

Even though we know that all scripture is given by inspiration

of God.

Sometimes we tend to skip over passages of scripture, or sometimes

the smaller books of the Bible get lost in the shuffle.

And so we are going to study a book that sometimes gets overlooked,

and that is the book of Zephaniah.

So if you have your bibles, turn to the book of Zephaniah.

Now this is a sore drill.

How many of you can find Zephaniah quickly?

It would be hard.

It's hard.

It's in there.

Now, some of you are cheating because you're on your phones.

I'm just kidding.

It's okay.

But you can get that fast.

Zephaniah.

But we're going to be in Zephaniah for the next foreseeable

future.

Okay.

I don't know how long we're going to be here.

We're going to take our time through the book of Zephaniah.

Sometimes you get to the minor prophets, and when we use that phrase,

minor prophets, we're not talking about that.

It's, there's minor and major importance to their message.

It's just we're talking about length, right?

So this is a smaller book of the Bible.

It's a smaller book that was a book of prophecy, but it's still

important for us to study in our understanding of who God is and

what he has done for us.

And so we have to go through a lot of introductory to get to the

main message.

But I want to give you a little bit of background and context

to this study.

Zephaniah is a book of the Bible written by a prophet named,

you guessed it, Zephaniah.

Okay.

He wrote this, and his name means defended or protected by God,

hid by God.

And we're going to see how that's significant as we study this

prophecy here.

We know that the date of the writing was in some time in the reign

of King Josiah.

We're going to study that here in a few moments.

And so that took place between 635 and 625 BC.

So this is happening about 600 years before Jesus.

And so this is obviously before the new testament.

Some of you are like, come on.

I knew that, pastor.

I can't take anything for granted.

So I'm setting up the context for you.

It's written specifically to the people that were in the southern

kingdom named Judah.

Okay?

Judah was where Jerusalem was located, if you remember, Israel

split, and there was the northern kingdom, which was considered

to be Israel.

That was the name.

And then you had the southern kingdom, which was Judah.

Now, Judah was the one that held on longer to the things of God.

The northern kingdom turned to idolatry earlier and got judged earlier.

And so Judah was the last remnant before the complete overthrow

of the babylonian kingdom.

So this is a book of the Bible written by Zephaniah the prophet

between 635 and 625 BC.

And Zephaniah's message was a message of judgment and encouragement.

It's important to know that his message is a message of judgment,

God's judgment upon sin.

And we're going to specifically talk about those sins

here through this study, but also encouragement for those who

come to Christ in repentance, or in this case, come to Yahweh,

God in repentance.

And so we're going to talk about that here in our study.

We're going to talk about the understanding of God's judgments

and the importance of knowing about God's judgment, knowing why

God judges how God judges, and ultimately, how we can avoid God's

judgment in faith, and knowing that God judges those who deserve

punishment.

And really, frankly, all of us deserve punishment.

So how can we, as believers today, understand the relationship

between God's love and his justice, his grace and his holiness?

We're going to talk through that here.

Now, there's some attributes of God that we have to understand

before we talk about his judgment, right?

My judgment is limited because I am flawed.

And so I don't know if you guys have dealt with your children

this way or maybe I was a teacher.

And so in class, I'd hear someone talking.

I turn around and I would assume it was that person.

I'd say, hey, stop talking.

It wasn't me talking.

And I might have misheard.

I might have thought it was someone or, you know, the.

The person pushes somebody and they push him back.

And I only see the person pushing back, and I get upset, and

I go, hey, you're in trouble, right?

My judgment is flawed because I don't see everything.

My judgment is flawed because ultimately, I'm fallible.

But God's judgment is perfect because he is perfect.

His defining character trait is his holiness.

And so when God judges, he justly judges those that need to

be condemned for their sins.

So we're gonna talk about that here in the book of Zephaniah.

And so let's look at verse number one.

We're going to see the genealogy of Zephaniah, which is

unique because we don't hear about the genealogy of prophets very

often in scripture.

And we're going to see why.

We are going to be told about his genealogy, and then we're going

to see the setting.

Okay?

So verse number one, the word of the Lord, which came unto Zephaniah,

the son of Cushai, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the

son of.

That's Hezekiah, or Hezekiah in the days of Josiah, the son of

Ammon, the king of Judah.

So there's so much packed into verse number one.

The first thing I wanna point out is the first phrase there, the

word of the Lord.

This is not the word of Zephaniah.

This is not his opinion.

This is not his political persuasion.

This is not his feelings.

This is the word of the Lord.

You have to understand, at this time frame, the way that God

spoke to his people was through the prophet, right?

So it's thus saith the Lord.

So it's not Zephaniah's opinion.

It's God's opinion.

It's God's truth coming through Zephaniah.

They didn't have the complete scope of scripture.

Okay?

So they didn't have it all complete.

And so what would happen is Zephaniah would come and he would

say, thus saith the Lord.

And then he would be speaking for God.

Now, we know today that we have the revealed word, complete

word, of God.

And so if I got up here tonight and I said, okay, this is

what the Bible says, but thus saith the Lord.

And I tell you my own opinion, okay, that's, number one, heresy.

And number two, you should say that's dangerous, because the Bible

says not to add or subtract from the completion of the word.

So in this case, when Zephaniah says something here, he's

Speaking for God.

And so it's essentially God speaking directly to the people of

Judah.

So the word of the Lord which came unto Zephaniah, and then we

go through his genealogy.

Now, why is his genealogy so important in this case?

Most commentators believe that he was of the descendant of King

Hezekiah, which would mean that this is the only prophet that

is linked to royalty.

And so the first verse of the prophecy of Zephaniah sets it apart

from most of the other prophets in that it tells us the

timeframe and the lineage of the prophet.

So Zephaniah is unusual because most commentators would say

that he is from royal lineage, descending from the godly king Hezekiah.

And so we also see another individual mentioned, Josiah.

Most of you know Josiah.

Josiah was a godly young king who brought revival to Judah.

And so Judah was overseen by Josiah.

He reigned for ten years before he led his great revival.

And I hope you know that story right.

They found the scriptures.

Josiah told them to read the scriptures.

And then with those scriptures being readdez, there was that great

revival and that turnaround there, a temporary revival, by the

way, they reverted back.

But in this case, Josiah was a godly king, one of the few godly

kings.

Obviously, there was more in Judah than in the northern kingdom.

But in this case, there was still an opportunity for God to be

seen there in Judah.

But basically what we're going to see is that the judgment was just

delayed in this time.

So Zephaniah was likely written before the revival happened,

early on in the reign of Josiah there in Judah.

And so we have twelve minor prophets, and they're divided into

two groups.

And I don't want to get too intellectual here for you this evening,

or academic, but I do need you to understand this.

You have nine that are pre exilic, meaning prior to the exile,

that they went to Babylon and all that.

And then you have the three posts, okay?

The three that happened after.

And so this would be the last of the pre exile prophets.

Okay?

So just so that you understand where this is in the timeline.

So he quotes a lot of other prophets.

He's essentially rehashing a lot of what's already been said with

the minor prophets.

But ultimately, he's gonna be preaching judgment.

So let's look at verse number two.

He says, I will utterly consume.

Now, remember, this is not Zephaniah saying he's gonna consume.

He's speaking for God.

And so he's speaking of God's judgment that is to come.

And it says this, I will utterly consume all things from off

the land, saith the Lord.

Well, he doesn't pull any punches in his first line.

Okay.

You know, sometimes they tell you it's how you start and how you

finish that matters.

Well, we see how Zephaniah starts.

He doesn't come in and give any frills.

He just says, hey, look, God is going to consume all things from

off the land.

And so in this case, we know that KING Josiah inherited a corrupt

nation from his father, AmmOn, and from his grandfather Manasseh.

And so this isn't God just coming down on a whim and just saying,

I don't like you guys today.

This is a longstanding culture of idolatry and evil.

We're going to get into that here in the Study as well.

What kind of judgment that is coming to these people and why this

judgment is coming.

So he says, I will utterly consume all things.

And so this speaks of a complete judgment for the sins of

the people here in Judah.

And so we see in verse number three, he says, I will consume man

and beast.

I will consume the fowls of the heaven, the fishes of the sea,

and the stumbling blocks with the wicked.

I will cut off man from off the land, saith the Lord.

And so we see that God is serious about what they are doing.

He is serious about their rebellion.

And God speaks here to his holy justice.

And this is something that as christians, we really need to understand

that God is a loving goddess, and we should preach that.

We should preach what the New Testament says in one John.

It says that God is love, but in God's love is also his holiness,

and in God's love is also his judgment.

And we talked about the analogy of a righteous judge, right?

If someone came before a judge and he overlooked evil, he wouldn't

be a righteous judge.

And so in God's defining character trait of his holiness,

he must judge.

He must judge evil.

And so I believe that this is a wonderful picture of God's holiness

and saying that I will cut off this land if this continues.

And so we see really in verse four where the judgment is going

to go.

Who is God going to specifically judge verse number four,

I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah.

Now, this is.

You might skip over that.

And you might say, well, that's not significant.

It is significant because these people that were in Judah were

used to hearing about God's judgment to the northern kingdom

and for the people that were in other lands, the pagans, the idolaters.

But in this case, he's specifically saying, no, you right.

It's easy.

Sometimes.

When I did this a lot, and I still do this, if I'm hearing good

preaching, sometimes I'm like, wow, that's really good.

I hope that person over there got that, because I don't struggle

with this.

Right.

Sometimes it's easy to disassociate ourselves from the conviction

of the message.

And so God is being very clear here, saying, no, this isn't just

a vague judgment on the world.

This is a judgment to you, Judah, the ones who think that you're

in the right.

And we're going to see that there were a lot of people that were

living in complacency in Judah at this point.

I think that if we change a few of the settings and we change

some of the names here, that we could take the message that Zephaniah

preaches and insert it.

Today in our society, there were people that were basically overlooking

God's word.

They were coming to a place in their life where they felt like they

were worshiping God, but they were worshiping idols.

They were worshipping Baal and Moloch.

And we're gonna talk about those false gods here in a few moments.

So he says, I will stretch out my hand upon Judah.

So this is God personalizing the message to the hearer.

And so this would be, you know, the pastor getting up and saying,

guys, I know that you think that I'm talking about the people

that are out there in the world, but church, this is us.

This is our problem.

And sometimes as a church, we fail in the concept of, when we hear

sin preached about, we think that we're talking about these evil

people that are not christians, that are out there in

the world, that are against us.

But really, folks, the problem sometimes, and where the revival

starts is within the body of believers, within God's people.

And so this is what that is all about.

God is addressing his people and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

So he gets even more specific, and then he gets really specific

in the type of people that he is going to cut down.

He says in verse four, and I will cut off the remnant of Baal.

From this place, he directly addresses the false God Baal and

those that worship him.

And so in this case, we know that God hates idolatry.

We know that.

And apparently both the leadership and the people were entrenched

in Baal worship.

And so in this case, he says, I'm gonna cut off the remnant of

Baal.

I'm gonna stop the influence of Baal from this place.

Now, if you do some study on who or what Baal was, Baal was the

fertility God of this area.

And the people that worshiped Baal would do horrendous acts.

They would self mutilate.

If you know the story of Elijah at Mount Carmel, remember

when they were trying to compel Baal to send the fire before

God?

They were cutting themselves, right?

There's this self mutilation.

We're even gonna talk through this, that through very heinous things.

They were sacrificing their children to Baal and Moloch.

Baal was something that they could access.

Baal was something that they could carve out on a piece of wood

and put up in their house.

And they could see it, and it was something that they could materialize

in their mind, and then they could touch and they could see.

And Baal reminded them of themselves.

Right?

Baal was this individual, this God that they thought identified

with them.

And so Baal was the prevailing worship at that time.

And so God says, I'm gonna cut out idolatry.

I'm gonna cut out this evil.

And then he says, and the name of the.

And this is a word that we don't use very frequently.

Cause it's not an english word.

It's actually a transliteration of a hebrew word.

And so it's the chimerons.

And so these were the priests that were acting like they were worshiping

God, but they were worshiping.

They were blending in Baal worship.

And so I think that this is very interesting, because eventually

what he's going to get to is that these were false priests who

claimed to serve God.

They were claiming, and they were taking the role of a priest

that was Worshiping the one true God, but yet they were not.

They were compromising.

And so they were pagan priests, and they were sacrificing

to Baal.

They were sacrificing to Moloch and other pagan deities.

And so these were the pagan priests that God was announcing judgment

against.

These were the individuals that were leading the people away

from the true worship of God and leading them to false worship.

And so in this case, Josiah, is, we know in two kings stops this.

He stops the practice of burning incense to Baalje and worship

of the sun and the moon.

He tears down altars of Baal and destroyed all this.

And so we know that ultimately they are wiped out in this case.

And so he says, these chairmans, these are the ones that

are WORSHIPping.

Now, I did some research on what that word means.

It means like dark, darkness.

And so you could take that from a spiritual sense that they

were dark in their actions.

But it also could have MEant that the gowns that the priests wore

that were white, if they were burning things to Bale and they were

burning things to Moloch, that they would have been characterized

by that smokiness on their outfits.

And so there's a lot of speculation on why they recall this.

But ultimately, we know that they were evil priests that were

taking the place of godly priests, but yet they weren't.

And so this is God speaking to hypocrisy.

This is God speaking to individuals that are acting like

they're worshiping God, but they're not.

They're worshiping other things, and then they're leading

other people astray.

False teachers, false worshipers, wolves in sheep's clothing.

We see that mentioned in the New Testament.

God hates that.

God hates when people pose as christians, pose as godly people,

pose as biblical preachers, but yet are worshipping other things

along with that.

And so we even see that back at that time frame, they would mingle

their worship.

Some of the folks up in the northern kingdom actually built like

mini temples, and they basically tried to mirror the worship

that was commanded by God, but yet they mingled in the baal worship.

And what does that look like for us today?

Well, that looks like us following the word of God, but yet

infusing into our worship things of the world, infusing into

the church the things of this world, and then overlooking it for

the sake of prosperity, overlooking it for the sake of man

praise and man worship and all that.

So we're seeing that here, God's judging their hypocrisy, God's

judging their misleading worship, and God's judging them for

their ultimate sin that they're committing against him and

others.

Verse five.

And them that worship the host of heaven.

Now, if you read this, you would say the host of heaven.

That sounds like they're worshiping goddess.

It's talking about worshiping stars, bodies, heavenly bodies, stars,

planets, you know, something like that.

So there was a type of worship that they would do.

They would get up on their housetops in the middle of the night,

and they would worship and swear by those stars and the moon

and all that.

So it's basically worshipping the astrology, right?

It's worshiping these stars and going by these stars.

And so I would encourage you to see it as that, because a lot

of people read that and they say, well, why is he getting upset

with them for worshiping the host of heaven?

That's not talking about the host of heaven, God.

That's talking about the false gods of the sky, so to speak.

And so it's a clear violation of God's law.

If you look at Deuteronomy, chapter four, verse 19, God warned

his people not to worship the heavenly bodies.

And so I would encourage you to think about it from that perspective.

And then also in Exodus, chapter 20, verse three and four,

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

we know that God commanded his people to worship him and him alone

and not to bow down to other gods.

And so this is in direct violation to God's law and the fact

that they are worshiping things outside of him.

And so we see God very serious about people worshiping things that

are not him.

And I would encourage you to think about that here this evening

because.

Why?

Well, if you're like me, you're starting to think, well, I

don't worship baal.

I don't carve things out and put that on my mantle.

I'm not worshiping Moloch.

I'm not worshiping the moon, the stars.

I'm glad you're not.

That's good.

But what we do know that within our culture today that there

are individuals who do worship things that are not God, right?

So a hobby, a lifestyle, money, a relationship, whatever it

is, fill in the blank.

If it's anything outside of God, that's idolatry.

And sometimes we take it from the perspective of idolatry only

when I carve something out of wood or I make it out of gold.

But no, the Bible says very clearly that idolatry is putting

anything before God.

And God is very clear in scripture that he hates idolatry.

And so if we want to be honoring God, what do we do?

Well, we don't do what they're doing here by going up onto the rooftops

and worshiping certain things that cause them to be in awe or in

wonder.

But in deuteronomy, chapter four, God warned that against them.

He warned that.

He said, idolatry is forbidden.

Verse 19, he says, unless thou lift up thine eyes into heaven, and

when thou seest the sun and the moon and the stars, even all

the hosts of heaven shouldest be driven to worship to them and

serve them.

Which the Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations under the

whole heaven.

But the Lord hath taken you and brought you forth out of the

iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be unto him a people of

inheritance, as ye are this day.

So meaning this.

Don't worship anything else outside of God.

Why?

Because God is the one who has saved you.

God is the one that has brought you out of Egypt.

Those stars, that moon, that planet, didn't pull you out of Egypt.

You know, that false God, that's the fertility God, or the

God of rain or the God of whatever, that God did not pull you

out of where you were.

It is God and God alone who saves you from your sin.

And so what he's saying here is, don't allow your worship to be

stolen.

Don't allow your worship to be taken away from the one who deserves

that worship.

And we talked about that on Sunday morning.

When it comes to this idea of where my heart is, where is my love?

And so he says, don't do that.

This is where the judgment's going to come, he says, and then

that worship, and then swear by the Lord, and that swear by Malcolm.

And that's another way to say Moloch.

Moloch was an old Testament God back at that time frame.

And they.

Again, by the way, false gods are fake.

Right?

But we do know that there were demons who were parading around like

gods that were influencing these people.

And so there was something there, right?

There was a force, an evil force that was about that they were

worshipping, just as there's evil forces today.

And so, yes, that little idol on the countertop was not real.

But the evil forces behind that idolatry are real.

The Bible says that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but

about the spirituality, the darkness.

And it's a spiritual battle.

And so I would tell you that there are certain things that in

and of themselves are not evil, but they can become evil when

they grip our hearts.

And Satan is always working against us when it comes to that.

He's always trying to fill in our minds with something.

And if our minds are not filled with the word of God, the

truth of God, he will fill our minds with something else.

And two Corinthians, chapter ten is all about that.

Casting down our imaginations, not entertaining the thoughts of

the enemy, because he's putting lies in.

He's trying to corrupt our minds.

And so what I would tell you, when it comes to this in our own

life is as believers, we have to set our minds and our hearts upon

the things of God, not on the things of this world.

Because when we do so, we begin to give a foothold for the

enemy.

And therefore, the Bible says that Satan is his Ephesians.

Satan is firing these fiery darts.

And if we don't have the armor of God up, we don't have the helmet

of salvation, the breastplate of righteousness, the sword of the

spirit, we're allowing these fiery darts to come in and attack

us.

And ultimately, we know that that is devastating for the life

of an individual.

And he says, you that swear by the Lord and that swear by Moloch,

meaning they're double tongued.

They're double minded.

James chapter one warns us about being a double minded man.

A double minded man is unstable in all of his ways.

What's a double minded man?

A double minded man is an individual who wants the blessings

of God, who wants to swear by God, who wants to lift up the name

of God, but in the same vein, also wants to lift up the things

of this world and have both.

That's a double minded man.

And so God is against that.

God hates that.

And so he says, those that swear by the Lord and those that

swear by Moloch, meaning in the same breath, they're praising

God, but also in the same breath, they're praising Moloch,

who had child sacrifice.

That was the main thing for Moloch.

And we went to, when we were in Israel, they had these things

called the high places, and that would be where they would go,

and they would commit these heinous acts.

And it really put into perspective how that was something.

And usually those high places were very close to where they would

worship.

And so you would just see that dichotomy.

You would see that contrast between the evil and the good and

how it was so mingled together.

It was so mingled together.

And that's what we see within the church today.

We see individuals who say, you know what?

I want to have all the blessings of God.

I want to praise God.

Like, we're going to sing christian songs, and we're going

to have our scripture verse of the day.

But then also, on the other side of things, what am I filling

my time in with?

What am I entertaining myself with?

What am I truly in my heart dwelling upon?

The Bible speaks very clearly about the importance of meditating

upon scripture.

What is meditation?

Well, I was always told meditation was empty in your mind.

That's actually not the biblical definition of meditation.

The biblical definition of meditation is filling our minds with

something.

And so meditating upon scripture is filling our minds on

scripture and dwelling upon it, chewing on it.

I always use the analogy of what that really means in the original

language.

It's the picture of the animal that chewed the cud.

And I gross everyone out when I say this.

So if you know what that's all about, I won't describe it to you.

But essentially, an animal will chew on something, chew on something,

take it in, and then put it back out and chew on it more and

get every nutrient that they can out of it.

That's the way that we're supposed to deal with scripture.

The problem is, is that most of the time, we don't dwell on the

things of God.

What do we do?

We dwell on the things of negative values, and we dwell in

things that are not pure.

Philippians, chapter four, verse eight, says, for us to dwell

on those things which are pure, to meditate upon those things

which are true.

And what happens, at least for me, in my life, is instead of dwelling

upon the truths of God, I'm dwelling upon what I watched on the

news, or I'm dwelling upon what possibly could happen to me

over here or what did happen to me back there.

And all I can think about is those negative things and those lies

that God does not want us to be dwelling on.

But yet that pulls us away from our worship to God.

Because if we're dwelling on the negative, we're not going to

be thankful.

We're not going to be giving him praise.

We're not going to be giving him what he desires from us.

And so we see there at the end of verse five, he says, don't be

a double minded person.

That's the one that gets judgment.

And it says, and them that are turned back from the Lord, those

are the ones that have turned their backs.

And those that have not sought the Lord nor inquired of him.

So he's speaking here not just of those that are out demonic, Allen,

out pagan.

He's talking about those people that have just turned their

backs against God.

They've backslidden.

They've gotten away from that zeal.

They've gotten away from their purpose.

They've gotten away from remembering what God did for their

fathers, what God did for their ancestors before bringing them

out of Egypt, leading them across the Red Sea, bringing them

across the Jordan river, giving them that beautiful promised

land.

They've forgotten.

They've turned their backs.

They have not sought after the Lord.

They don't inquire for him.

This speaks of the complacency of the church today.

I believe that God hates complacency.

He hates apathy.

Right?

We know that sometimes it's very easy to get into a spiritual

rut.

I know this because I've been there.

We come in on Sunday mornings, we play the part, we sit down, we

go home.

But we are not inquiring of God.

The only God or the only word of his truth comes into our life

on Sunday mornings or Sunday nights or Wednesday nights.

And we can get so busy with the christian life that we lose God

in all of it.

Our eyes are off of him and on to the ministry.

And I can tell you by way of testimony that even a pastor can

get his eyes so fixed on the things of ministry that the heart

of God is missed.

And I can tell you that's a shameful thing to say.

But sometimes what we do is we justify even things that are not

necessarily bad, they might be good.

We justify something in our life.

For example, I can justify, well, hey, you know what?

I need to do this, this, this, and this for ministry.

So therefore, I can let my personal Bible study go aside.

Or maybe I need to go make another visit or.

No, I need to go write another sermon and then neglect my family.

Folks, God doesn't want you to neglect your family.

God doesn't want you to neglect your prayer life in the sake

of ministry.

He wants us to be fully given over to him, and everything else

will fall in line.

And so here he's talking in verse six about those people who

have lost their zeal for that personal relationship with him.

And how often do we see people losing their zeal for that personal

relationship?

There was a time, maybe where you said, you know, I just love talking

with God.

I was so excited to get to my private time with him, my secret

place, to get into my devotions, to pray.

And you know what?

Now maybe there's not that much excitement anymore.

Maybe it seems now like a chore for me to get there and read

my daily bread and make sure I pray a couple times a day before

I eat, maybe before I go to bed.

No.

The Bible says that we are to live a lifestyle of prayer.

We're to live a lifestyle of worship.

If the only time that we are worshiping is Sunday mornings, and

then if you come back on Sunday nights and then on Wednesday

nights, you say, that's pretty impressive, pastor.

I come three times a week, and I'm worshiping three times a week.

We're missing the point.

There's corporate worship and that's exciting to do together.

Right?

I love corporate worship.

I love coming to church.

And it's not just because I work here.

Okay?

I love coming to church.

But our life should be characterized by worship.

It's not just on Sunday morning.

It's not just on Sunday nights.

It's not just Wednesday nights.

The Bible says in one corinthians chapter ten, whether

therefore ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do, do all of the glory

of God.

And so I think that this is speaking here in this case to those

who have lost that zeal for that personal walk with goddess.

And so we're going to obviously continue on in this study,

but we know that here in this first introduction that God is specifically

speaking to the things that he hates and the things that he will

judge, and that is idolatry.

A lack of zeal, a lack of passion, ultimately a hypocrisy.

They're essentially lying to others and maybe even in SOme cases,

lying to themselves.

Did you know the Bible says that we can actually lie to ourselves,

that we can deceive Ourselves because we actually start Telling

ourselves that, hey, you know what?

I'm okay.

I'm doing okay.

But what does James chapter one, verse 22 say?

I want you to turn there with me because we're going to go a little

bit to the New Testament here tonight to kind of amplify upon what

Zephaniah is talking about here.

But in James chapter one, verse 22, if it's not convicting

for you, I don't know.

This is one of the most convicting passages for me.

James 122, it says, but be doers of the word and not hearers

only deceiving your own selves.

Meaning this, it's good to hear the word of God.

I mean, even back at the time of Zephaniah and Josiah, there were

still worship, right?

There were still things going on.

And so it's one thing to be hearers of the word, but the Bible

says that's not enough.

It says, but be doers of the word.

Why?

Because if you hear the word and agree with it but don't apply

it, you're deceiving yourself, is what it says here.

It's deceiving your own selves.

For if any, be a hearer of the word and not a doer.

He's like unto a man beholding his natural face and a glass, for

he beholdeth himself and goeth his way and straightway forgetteth

what manner of man he was.

And so he says they're basically the Bible is like a mirror.

It shows us where we are in our lives.

And someone who sees what they are or who they are and sees the

things that they need to change and just walks away.

Is someone who reads the word of God, sees the conviction, feels

the conviction, understands the conviction, but yet goes along

their life and doesn't change.

Verse 25.

But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, meaning this

is the one who looks into the word and continueth therein.

Meaning, he obeys it, she obeys it.

He being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this

man shall be blessed in his deed.

So the blessing is in the obedience, not just in the hearing

of the word.

It's in the heeding of the word.

I hear the word, I believe the word, I apply the word, I live the

word.

That's where the blessing comes.

You know?

I know sometimes it's like, well, it's such a blessing to hear

the word of God.

I've been in services where I've said amen.

And I agreed.

And I walked out of the service.

And then I had no clue what the pastor said, and I couldn't retain

it.

I'm like, well, I don't know.

He said some story about something.

I don't know.

And I left unaffected.

I left unchanged.

I agreed.

But I didn't leave with the obedience.

And so what we can see here in Zephaniah is that God hates the one

who is having a form of godliness.

And we're seeing that in the New Testament.

And the New Testament says that in the end times, there will

be a form of godliness, but no holiness, the no truth, no righteousness.

And so there isn't a relationship.

There's just a form of godliness.

So God hates that.

God hates people that put on.

If you are tempted to think that God doesn't hate that, read

the gospels and see how Jesus deals with the Pharisees, right?

Who are the most religious people in Jesus time?

The Pharisees.

But they were the ones that he got the most upset with.

Because why?

They had a form of godliness, but no heart, no relationship.

And so if we're not tempted, we can sit here and go down the road

of destruction, saying, we're religious.

We're following the word.

We're fundamental.

We preach the word.

I that's great, but what does it mean when it comes to our lives?

And Zephaniah says, don't be those ones who have turned their

back from the Lord.

Those have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of him and what

we can see.

And I'm sensitive to the time.

So I'll have one last reference.

In the New Testament, we go to Romans chapter one.

Romans chapter one explains to us what is the natural process that

happens when we begin to turn our hearts away from the truth of

God and misappropriate our worship.

And I think that most of you probably are familiar with this,

but essentially what the Bible says here in this case is that over

time, Romans 120, he just gets off in verse 16 about explaining,

I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ.

For it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth,

to the jew first, and also to the Greek.

For therein is righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith.

As it is written, the just shall live by faith.

And so he's speaking of really the truth of God and what changes

us.

And then he talks about God's wrath against ungodliness.

And so it says in verse 18.

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all

ungodliness and unrighteousness of Mendez, who hold

the truth of unrighteousness.

Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them.

For God hath showed it unto them.

And then here's verse number 20.

And I think it's important to see this.

It says, for the invisible things of him from creation of the

world are clearly seen, meaning God's handiwork is evident

to all right, everyone.

You don't have to be a believer to see God's power in this

world, his creation.

And I don't know about you, but all you got to do is spend about

five minutes walking outside.

And you can see the beauty of the trees, the beauty of all of that.

And it says that the creation is clearly seen, being understood

by the things that are made.

And so the unseen things, the unseen things of faith are seen in

the creation of God.

That's not enough to save us, but it's enough for us to understand

that there is a powerful God, he says, even his eternal power and

godhead, so that they are without excuse.

Because that when they knew God, they glorified him not as goddesse.

So they realized that there is a God, but they didn't glorify him

as God.

Neither were thankful.

They lost their gratitude, but became vain in their imaginations.

Empty in their imaginations.

Or you could say, thoughts.

This is what we were talking about, right?

And their foolish heart was darkened.

So their hearts become darkened, professing themselves to

be wise.

They became fools.

The Bible says the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, right?

That's the start of wisdom is the fear of God.

When we lose our fear of God, we then lose the wisdom of God and

we become fools.

And so then it goes on to list all these things that essentially

is the product of that.

And change the glory of the uncorruptible God into the image

made unto a corruptible man.

Meaning we change our worship from the one who should be worshipped

to the things that were the creation.

And so all of this, verse 25, who changed the truth of God into

a lie and worshiped and served the creature more than the creator.

This speaks to the real heart issue of idolatry.

They lose the fear of God, they lose the presence of God, they

lose the desire to know him and to glorify him.

And so therefore they turn from worshipping him and they go

to his creation.

They worship the creation and not the creator.

And there's a lot more in that chapter.

I'm not going to give you a diatribe on romans chapter one yet.

That's a little bit of a precursor to a future study that

we're going to be doing.

But ultimately, what we see here is that the natural inclination

of man, when we turn our faces away from God, is to worship the

things of this world, the good thing, even, even the good things

in creation.

And that's why, yes, God created the moon.

God created the stars, God created the sun.

But when individuals who say they worship God turn to those things,

it's an indication of where their heart is.

Their heart is not where it needs to be.

And so in Zephaniah, that's where we start.

God says, I'm going to judge.

Now.

The beauty is that God always gives grace and mercy to those that

are repentant.

God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

Right.

And so in our pride comes God's judgment.

In our humility, in submission, in faith comes the grace,

comes the forgiveness.

And so it's really still God's heart in the book of Zephaniah to

say, judgment is coming, but there is a possibility for forgiveness

if you turn your hearts back to God in repentance.

And so there is a message of judgment, but there's also a message

of hope, and there's a message of encouragement that you can always

turn to the Lord.

And so I would tell you this, and that's the same message that

we need to preach today.

There are some people, I know this is a long study here, but this

is a long Runway for our whole study.

In Zephaniah.

There are some people that say, don't preach about the judgment

of God.

We don't want to hear about that.

Please, please, just talk about how much God loves everybody.

And I agree.

We preach the whole gospel.

Preach the whole gospel.

If I preach that God loves you, I have to understand God doesn't

love your sin.

It would be like me saying, okay, I love all the children of

Middletown Baptist church, like the little kids of Middletown

Baptist church.

I love all of them, but I love them differently than I love my children.

I hope you guys understand that.

I love all the kids here, but my children are my children.

Right?

And so there's a distinction that God loves the world by sending

his only begotten son.

But God doesn't love an individual that's in rebellion to

him the same way that he loves his son, that he loves his daughter.

And so there is that general love that God extends to all and

proved his love by dying on the cross for your sins.

But God does not continue to condone the sin of an unsaved person.

He doesn't condone the saved I the saved sinner.

Right.

He always wants us to come back to a heart of repentance.

Now, there's grace and there's mercy.

And so I know that maybe some of you might have misinterpreted

me and says God doesn't love everybody.

He loves everybody in the fact that he extends the gospel to all.

But I think it's very clear in scripture that God has his true family

that he loves and that he protects and that he sustains, and

all those have an opportunity to come to Christ.

And so that's his love.

And so what I would encourage you to think about here this evening

is this.

As a believer, what does it mean for me to preach the whole truth

of God?

It does mean that we have to preach God's judgment.

Because what if I come up to somebody and say, hey, God loves

you and he doesn't care about what you're doing in your life?

You're all going to go to heaven if you just are passionate

about something?

Well, that's not me preaching the whole gospel.

I have to preach to you that the Bible says for the wages of sin

is death.

Now, I don't preach that alone.

I don't come up to someone and thump them over the head with the

Bible and say, you're going to hell and walk away.

No, you tell them that there is going to be judgment and we don't

know when that is ultimately going to happen.

The Bible says life is but a vapor and that today is the day of

salvation.

But what we do is we say, hey, look, there is a judgment to come,

but there's also a gift of grace that God loves you.

And so that's what Zephaniah, Zephaniah is preaching the Gospel.

He's preaching judgment, but also repentance and encouragement

in that.

And so I would encourage you to think about that when we come

to this understanding of the Gospel.

Now, there are people on both sides of this.

There's people that will only preach one aspect.

There's people over here that only preach one aspect.

The concept would be to preach the whole revelation of the word

of God, and that is the complete Gospel judgment and also

forgiveness, judgment and also grace.

And so we're going to see how that wraps up in God's holiness through

this study.

All right, well, I appreciate your time.

I know that was a long study here this evening, but I think we

at least needed to get through those first six verses here tonight.

If you love to have you come back through the study in Zephaniah.

It's one that I've been really excited for.

It's one that sometimes we can skip over passages.

And I've read through the Bible many times.

I'm not going to lie to you.

Sometimes when I get to the genealogy and some of the minor prophets,

it's just like, okay, I've read this before, but I think that

there's so much to glean from this passage.

Even though it's three chapters, there's so much here.

So encourage you to follow along with us.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist church

podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

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Thank you so much.

God bless.

Have a wonderful day.