Sermons at Trinity Church

Zephaniah 1.1-2.3

THE DAY OF THE LORD

18^th April 2004

Jonny Elvin

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 All Bible references in this sermon transcript are taken from the English Standard Version. This can be found at www.biblegateway.com

Following the Hutton Report Ian Paisley stood in the House of Commons on 28 Jan 2004. He said this:

“The Prime Minister knows of the turmoil and division in the nation that this matter has caused, and now is the appropriate time for him to discuss with Her Majesty the Queen a national day of prayer that we may return to the old paths and remember this: [then he quoted from Proverbs 14.34] that justice and judgment are an honour to a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”

The Prime Minister responded with a chuckle and said…

“In respect of the day of prayer, I do not think that I shall be suggesting that to Her Majesty, but what he says about the importance of allegations of impropriety being properly sustained or withdrawn must indeed be correct. We do not need to engage in a great deal of prayer to achieve that: we could achieve it perfectly simply if we merely acted on it.”

(Hansard 28 Jan 2004 Column 355)

But of course acting with justice and right judgment isn’t just a matter of external application. What needs to happen is an internal reformation, where people’s hearts are inclined to the Lord’s ways.

It was very much the same in Zephaniah’s days. He ministered during the reign of King Josiah. Those of you who are more familiar with your Bible history will know that Josiah was a great king – the greatest, in fact, in the whole of Israel’s history. (Did you know, by the way, that Josiah was of wealthy Australian lineage? Son of Cushi, son of G’daylia!) V1

What made Josiah so good? He set about renewing the nation after the dreadful reigns of his father Amon and his grandfather Manasseh. They had reintroduced pagan worship after Manasseh’s dad, King Hezekiah, had famously done away with them. Under Amon and Manasseh the book of the Law had been lost in the temple and under Josiah it had been rediscovered. Josiah then set about reforming the nation in accordance with what it said. But even though Josiah was probably the greatest of the OT kings and his heart was set on obeying God’s ways, and even though they celebrated the Passover in a way that had outstripped even Hezekiah’s 2 week celebration, the people’s hearts needed changing afresh in each generation. Whoever it was who said ‘God doesn’t have grandchildren’ was right. It’s no good if your parents are Christians if you’re not. And as we teach our children to follow the Lord they must decide afresh too.

The other problem is that reforms cannot undo what’s already been done. And so God sends Zephaniah with a message of judgment. (Actually he sends more than one prophet in this era – he also sends Jeremiah, Habakkuk and Nahum). It’s a stark and sober message – we’ll also see that there is hope in this prophecy to God’s people, but the hope doesn’t come through institutional reorganisation or renewed structures (so if you’re planning that the Church of England will lead to reform within our nation think again!).

1.       The Lord comes in judgment on all creation 1.2-6

Look at the ‘I will’ statements piled up in these verses…

²"I will utterly sweep away everything from the face of the earth," declares the LORD.

³"I will sweep away man and beast;

I will sweep away the birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea, and the rubble^[1] [Or stumbling blocks (that is, idols)] with the wicked.

I will cut off mankind from the face of the earth," declares the LORD.

⁴"I will stretch out my hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem;
and I will cut off from this place the remnant of Baal and the name of the idolatrous priests along with the priests, ⁵those who bow down on the roofs to the host of the heavens, those who bow down and swear to the LORD and yet swear by Milcom, ⁶those who have turned back from following the LORD, who do not seek the LORD or inquire of him."

The Lord’s judgment is initially directed towards all creation before narrowing down to his own people of Judah and then to the people in Jerusalem.

We’re told who will be punished. But why will the Lord stretch out his hand against the people of Judah, v4? After all they are his people. Vv4-6 give us the reason for this devastating oracle. V4 there is still a remnant of Baal. They haven’t done away with all the false gods of Amon and Manasseh’s reigns. They’re guilty of syncretism, i.e. combining religions, joining forces. Some priests openly worship idols, whilst others do it in secret on the roofs of their homes. You can be sure that if they did it the people took their lead.

Their idolatry is to bow down to the host of the heavens rather than the God who made the heavens. They swear by Milcom, which isn’t the name of a telephone company, it’s the name of one of the gods of the Ammonites.

In short they’ve turned their back on God.

Whenever we add to the Christian faith the gods of our age – whether they be status, wealth, leisure, sport, personal ambition and mix worship of God with these things, then we dishonour the Lord. That’s why it’s good to fast from the things that are most likely to tempt us to worship false gods. Perhaps you’re tempted to worship the false god of consumerism – then don’t go shopping apart from absolutely necessary items for a week or a month. Perhaps your god is ‘the great god football’? then ignore it for a few weeks and see that in the end it doesn’t matter that much. No really it doesn’t! I read in the paper the other day about how football is the new religion.

In last Monday’s sport section of the Times Manuel Vazquez Montalban, the Catalan writer, described football as the only viable religion of the third millennium, arguing that the Cold War and the passing of the great ideological battles of the 1960s and 70s, coupled with the crisis of Western religions, had left a spiritual void that was now filled by football.

You can tell he comes from Barcelona not Exeter!

Whatever the gods of our age, falling for their promises of satisfaction and fulfilment and then mixing them with true faith is a dangerous business. Syncretism leads to death. V2 is reminiscent of the Flood. All who live like this will be swept away to their death.

You see, though reform is happening under Josiah the people’s hearts are still far from God. Remember what Jesus said to the Pharisees in Matthew 15:8-9, quoting Isaiah 29.13, 'This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.'"

And he went on to say that it’s what’s in a man’s heart that makes someone unclean – unfit for God’s presence.

But when will this judgment come?

2.       Judgment day is near 1.7-14

None of us likes to think about God’s judgment. But from 1.7 -14 Zephaniah forces us to imagine what ‘the Day of the Lord’ will be like.

⁷Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near; the LORD has prepared a sacrifice and consecrated his guests.

The Lord invited his people to a sacrifice, but his people are the ones who are to be sacrificed! This reflects the truth that where there is sin there must be death. We know that in Christ God has provided a substitute for us, and the death sentence has been paid by him. But those who don’t seek the Lord and put their trust in the atoning death of his son must pay for their own sin.

First in line for judgment are the political leaders. What’s their crime?

⁸And on the day of the LORD's sacrifice-- "I will punish the officials and the king's sons and all who array themselves in foreign attire. ⁹On that day I will punish everyone who leaps over the threshold, and those who fill their master's^[2] house with violence and fraud.

Wearing foreign clothes isn’t a crime for us, but here it’s a sign that they had chosen to follow the ways of other nations in worshipping their false gods. It’s a bit like me turning up wearing a turban – you’d think ‘what’s he doing? Has he started to believe that you can be a Sikh and a Christian at the same time?’ And you’d be right to worry.

Jumping over the threshold could be linked with a superstitious act from the Philistine religion. Or it could be the social wrongs of those who jump at the opportunity to be violent and fraudulent rather than being full of peace and honesty like God.

Next up for judgment is the business community.

¹⁰"On that day," declares the LORD, "a cry will be heard from the Fish Gate, a wail from the Second Quarter, a loud crash from the hills.

¹¹Wail, O inhabitants of the Mortar! For all the traders^[3] are no more; all who weigh out silver are cut off.

They’ll be going about their business when they’d see the enemy attacking from the North – the north was vulnerable to attacks and it’s where the Fish gate was in Jerusalem.

Mortar is probably the market area. But there will be no time for business when the local superpower Assyria invades.

Last up here are those who live as though there is no God. Diogenes, the pre-Christian Greek philosopher searched for an honest man, here God searches for the dregs of society.

¹²At that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps, and I will punish the men who are complacent,^[4] [lit. are thickening on the dregs [of their wine] ] those who say in their hearts, 'The LORD will not do good, nor will he do ill.'

One writer clearly expresses the problem when he writes, ‘The great causes of God and Humanity are not defeated by the hot assaults of the Devil, but by the slow, crushing, glacier-like mass of thousands and thousands of indifferent nobodies. God’s causes are never destroyed by being blown up, but by being sat upon’.

And what a blasphemy to say that God has done them no good. Just think of how many times God had rescued them – from Egypt, from the inhabitants of the Promised Land. He had met them and blessed them at Sinai and countless times since.

So many people in our country have the same attitude. ‘What has God done for us?’ they say. He has blessed us with godly men and women who have directed our laws according to his word, he has changed the hearts and minds of many people, influential or not so that communities and households have sought his ways and been salt and light in the world.

Take for example the fact that so many charities in this country were started by Christians who wanted to see this country with more godly standards of behaviour and care.

And of course God has acted with great good in sending the Lord Jesus, hasn’t he! What an act of kindness, which our forebears knew about, but which so many are ignorant of today.

The judgment for their apathy and errant theology is that God will destroy and confiscate the very sources of power that the people have refused to use for good.

¹³Their goods shall be plundered, and their houses laid waste. Though they build houses, they shall not inhabit them; though they plant vineyards, they shall not drink wine from them."

There will be no partying on judgment day.

¹⁴The great day of the LORD is near, near and hastening fast;

3.       Judgment day will be bitter 1.14-18

God’s judgment day will be bitter; a day of wrath, distress, anguish, ruin and devastation. A day of darkness, dark clouds and gloom (v15). It will be a day of battle (v16), blindness and blood (v17). Why?

‘…because they have sinned against the LORD’

Military strength will be as useful as skydiving with a paper bag for a parachute. Wealth will be as helpful as smiling at an approaching and hungry lion.

¹⁸ In the fire of his jealousy, all the earth shall be consumed; for a full and sudden end he will make of all the inhabitants of the earth.

What hope is there in the face of such an enemy?

4.       Seek the Lord 2.1-3

The only hope for Israel then and the world now is to seek the Lord for refuge. And so Zephaniah ends this section with a call to repentance while there is still time.

¹Gather together, yes, gather, O shameless nation, ²before the decree takes effect^[1] --before the day passes away like chaff--before there comes upon you the burning anger of the LORD, before there comes upon you the day of the anger of the LORD.

³Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands;^[2] seek righteousness; seek humility; perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the LORD

Some social commentators have noted that the UK is not unlike other superpowers at the end of their reign. Socially, culturally, morally we are degenerating. I accept that as a superpower we are not what we once were, but we are still a powerful nation. I don't want to equate us in any way with Israel as though the British are God’s people – clearly we’re not. But this day of judgment that came upon Israel, when in 586 BC Jerusalem fell to the Babylonian army.

Jesus has promised a day when he will return and his judgement will be even more comprehensive. It will be a terrible day for all who trust in themselves and ignore God. Imagine this judgment happening here in Exeter and in the UK as a whole. Join with me in crying out to God for mercy as we ask him to use even us to bring others to salvation as we proclaim the gospel message of refuge and call people to repent.

God keeps his covenant promises. That’s what we remember as we come to prayer and to the Lord’s table. We come, like Abram, as failed sinners to receive grace from him in our time of need.