Saturday, April 17, 2010

Zephaniah 3

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Was just going over the intro to Zephaniah again, I like to review it towards the end of the book. It's a theme we've been experiencing elsewhere lately so though I would repost it;

"Rain can be depressing- contstant dripping, wet clothes, mud, gray skies, and distant thunder. AFter many days of rain, we listen intently for positive clues in weather reports and search the skies for a sunny break in the clouds. We look for signs of change.

God's spokesman Zephaniah, had nothing but doom adn gloom to tell the people of Judah. Most of his prophecies, adn thus most of this book (two and on-half chapters to be exact) tell of God's terrible juegment upon the nations, including Judah herself. His words, liek the steady pounding of rain, continued to beat the depressing truth that God was not happy with the way people had flaunted his laws and worshiped idols and he would punish their sin, wiping out entire nations.

The constant negative, and truthful message would be enough to depress even the most positive optimist.

Suddenly a ray of hope broke through the clouds. Check out the last eleven verses of the book. God says: "At that time I will gather you; at that time I will bring you back home. I will give you honor and praise from people everywhere when I make things go well again for you, as you will see with your own eyes." 3:20

Hear God's Word thorugh his faithful prhophet, surely he will judge sin. But there is hope, deliverance adn salvation for those who trust in Him. The storm is over, take a walk in the sun!"

Max Lucado Devotional Bible

Unknown said...

"But the Lord is good and He is there in that city... Every morning He governs the people fairly every day He can be trusted." v5

What a comfort. In the midst of the turmoil and this topsy turvy world, God is constant. Constantly good.

I was particularly struck by vv11-12;

"I will remove from this city those who like to brag; there will never be any more proud people on myholy mountain in Jerusalem. but I will eave in the city thhe humble and thsoe who are not proud, and they will trust in the Lord." v11-12

the whole theme of pride and a proper spirit of humility is huge with me right now. I was reading something last night that mentioned the seven "deadly" sins and PRIDE just looked like it stood out in bold to me :) The list is interesting, I've never really contemplated it much before;

pride, anger, lust, envy, greed, sloth and gluttony. I couldn't help but think that our cultural (religious) paradigm of today seems to put the emphasis on very different things than those. Things that have an astigmatism... not things we each wrestle with daily. doing that immediately makes us guilty of what? Pride! Interesting.

One last thought on pride;

"One who is often reproved, yet remains stubborn, will suddenly be broken beyond healing," says the writer of Proverbs. Stubborness is the pride that causes us to shun correction. It renders us unable to stop defending ourselves. When someone points out an error or flaw we evade or deny or blame someone else. This is difficult to penetrate because defensive people are rarely receptive to having their defensiveness pointed out."

John Ortberg, Appropriate Smallness

Such sobering thoughts, I am so thankful to get some clarity on thing ugly thing called pride though, I have to admit, my eyes have been rather glaced over when it comes to truly identifying it in my life and tackling it.

Jude said...

v17 "The Lord is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."

I would love to know that I have done something that would cause the Lord to rejoice with singing! He has given me so much and I love Him dearly.

I noticed the pride /humility section also. Harsh words. A bible study I have been doing has has a large focus on this area and how much God hates pride. I have searched my heart and found fault and then search it again and find fault again. It is an ongoing battle to take one's thoughts captive and not allow them to take us captive in sin.