"And it shall come to pass at that time That I
will search Jerusalem with lamps, And punish the men Who are settled in
complacency, Who say in their heart, 'The LORD will not do good, Nor will He do evil.' Therefore their goods shall become booty, And
their houses a desolation; They shall build houses, but not inhabit
them; They shall plant vineyards, but not drink their wine." Zephaniah 1:12-13, NKJV
For those who have been following this series, you may noticed I jumped from verse 6 of the first chapter of Zephaniah to the twelvth. The reason is I want to focus on verse twelve. But allow me to catch you up, especially since its been two weeks since I posted in this series.
You may recall that Zephaniah was a descendant of King Hezekiah, and prophesied during the days of Hezekiah's great grandson, Josiah. The first words of the message was that God will utterly consume everything from the land. Why? The first point he made was that there were idolatrous priests who worshiped the heavens, swore by gods in addition to the true God, and have turned from following God nor have sought Him.
Verse seven reads, "Be silent in the presence of the Lord GOD; For the day of the LORD is at hand, For the LORD has prepared a sacrifice; He has invited His guests." The Day of the LORD, which will be dealt with later in the chapter, is a day of judgment, and normally connected to what is known as the Seven year Tribulation.
Verses eight through thirteen look at judgments on four groups of people. Let me introduce the first three groups:
- The princes and king's children who are clothed in foreign (KJV reads "strange") clothing;
- Those who leap over the threshold and fill their masters' houses with violence and deceit; and
- Merchants and moneyhandlers.
Some of these groups are not clearly identified, and I doubt most of my blog readers fall into any of them. In our country and especially in the church, the fourth group is the biggest problem.
Who is that fourth group? Those settled in complacency. The notes in my Bible say it's litterally the dregs in the wine barrel. I'm not familiar with wine dregs, but I'm very familiar with the dregs at the bottom of a cup of hot chocolate. And if you leave them for a while, they can be tougher to clean.
Verse twelve gives a concise definition of what complacency is like - it is saying that God won't do good and that He won't do evil. He won't bless us, and He won't judge us. In other words, we're on our own. It is like the mindset of Deism, that God wound this world up and then sat back and watched what would happen. Or as the classic song "From A Distance" says, God watches us from a distance. He's not nearby, He's not actively involved.
Both extremes are evident today. On the one hand, there are those who quote that verse from 3rd Hezekiah or The Acts Of The Apostates or another non-existent Biblical book that says "God helps those who help themselves." For example, they claim that our Presidents aren't raised up or appointed by God (Dan. 2:20-22; Rom. 13:1), but are elected by the people. Or they prescribe activism because that has more results than prayer.
On the other side, we have a God who one professor I heard said has love more like a grandfather than a father. This God is a god of love, not of wrath. This God's definition of evil is pretty consistent with our society. If we have no problem with a behavior that is described as sin, then God's not concerned about it and we've probably misinterpreted the Bible.
We need to realize God will bless the righteous and punish the wicked. Sometimes, it seems the reality is the opposite, but that's because we're looking at the temporary things which we can see rather than the eternal things that aren't seen (2 Cor. 4:18).
One can look at Zephaniah 1:7-13 and say it was more for the people of the prophet's day, and the coming judgment was accomplished by Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonians. But there is an application for us today. Plus, God has promised there will be in the future a resurrection of all - some to eternal life, and some to eternal contempt (Dan. 12:2; John 5:28-29).
In your life, do your actions reflect that you expect God to do good when you're obedient? Do they show you expect His chastisement when you sin or judgment when a society or God's people reject Him? Or are you settled in the complacent mindset?
No comments:
Post a Comment