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Zephaniah
Chapter Two
Zephaniah 2
Chapter Contents
An exhortation to repentance. (1-3) Judgments upon other
nations. (4-15)
Commentary on Zephaniah 2:1-3
(Read Zephaniah 2:1-3)
The prophet calls to national repentance
as the only way
to prevent national ruin. A nation not desiring
that has not desires toward
God
is not desirous of his favour and grace
has no mind to repent and reform.
Or
not desirable
not having any thing to recommend them to God; to whom God
might justly say
Depart from me; but he says
Gather together to me that you
may seek my face. We know what God's decree will bring against impenitent
sinners
therefore it highly concerns all to repent in the accepted time. How
careful should we all be to seek peace with God
before the Holy Spirit
withdraws from us
or ceases to strive with us; before the day of grace is
over
or the day of life; before our everlasting state is determined! Let the
poor
despised
and afflicted
seek the Lord
and seek to understand and keep
his commandments better
that they may be more humbled for their sins. The
chief hope of deliverance from national judgments rests upon prayer.
Commentary on Zephaniah 2:4-15
(Read Zephaniah 2:4-15)
Those are really in a woful condition who have the word
of the Lord against them
for no word of his shall fall to the ground. God will
restore his people to their rights
though long kept from them. It has been the
common lot of God's people
in all ages
to be reproached and reviled. God
shall be worshipped
not only by all Israel
and the strangers who join them
but by the heathen. Remote nations must be reckoned with for the wrongs done to
God's people. The sufferings of the insolent and haughty in prosperity
are
unpitied and unlamented. But all the desolations of flourishing nations will
make way for the overturning Satan's kingdom. Let us improve our advantages
and expect the performance of every promise
praying that our Father's name may
be hallowed every where
over all the earth.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on Zephaniah》
Zephaniah 2
Verse 1
[1] Gather yourselves together
yea
gather together
O
nation not desired;
Gather yourselves — Call a solemn
assembly
proclaim a fast.
Not desired — Or
not desirous. Unwilling to
return
and unworthy to be received on your return.
Verse 2
[2] Before the decree bring forth
before the day pass as
the chaff
before the fierce anger of the LORD come upon you
before the day of
the LORD's anger come upon you.
The decree — Before God's decree is put in
execution.
The day — Before the day of your calamities.
As the chaff — Carry you away as the wind
carries chaff away.
Verse 3
[3] 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.
Seek — Fear
worship
depend on him alone.
Ye meek — Ye humble ones.
Wrought his judgment — Obeyed his precepts.
Seek righteousness — Continue therein.
Seek meekness — Patiently wait on the just and
merciful God.
Hid — Under the wing of Divine Providence.
Verse 4
[4] For Gaza shall be forsaken
and Ashkelon a desolation:
they shall drive out Ashdod at the noon day
and Ekron shall be rooted up.
For — It is time to seek God; for your neighbours
as well
as you
shall be destroyed.
Gaza — A chief city of the Philistines.
They — The Babylonians.
Shall drive — Into captivity.
At the noon day — It shall be taken by force at
noon.
Verse 5
[5] Woe unto the inhabitants of the sea coast
the nation of
the Cherethites! the word of the LORD is against you; O Canaan
the land of the
Philistines
I will even destroy thee
that there shall be no inhabitant.
The inhabitants — All the Philistines.
Cherethites — Or destroyers
men that were
stout
fierce
and terrible to their neighbours.
O Canaan — That part that the Philistines kept by force from the
Jews.
Verse 6
[6] And the sea coast shall be dwellings and cottages for
shepherds
and folds for flocks.
For shepherds — Instead of cities full of rich
citizens
there shall be only cottages for shepherds.
Verse 7
[7] And the coast shall be for the remnant of the house of
Judah; they shall feed thereupon: in the houses of Ashkelon shall they lie down
in the evening: for the LORD their God shall visit them
and turn away their
captivity.
The coast — The sea-coast
the land of the
Philistines.
The remnant — That survive the captivity.
Shall feed — Their flocks.
In the houses — In places where these formerly
stood.
They — Both shepherds and flocks.
Shall visit — In mercy.
Verse 8
[8] I have heard the reproach of Moab
and the revilings of
the children of Ammon
whereby they have reproached my people
and magnified
themselves against their border.
I — God.
Magnified themselves — Invading their
frontiers.
Verse 9
[9] Therefore as I live
saith the LORD of hosts
the God of
Israel
Surely Moab shall be as Sodom
and the children of Ammon as Gomorrah
even the breeding of nettles
and saltpits
and a perpetual desolation: the
residue of my people shall spoil them
and the remnant of my people shall
possess them.
Of nettles — Not cultivated
but over-run with
nettles.
Salt-pits — A dry
barren earth
fit only to
dig salt out of.
The residue — That return out of Babylon.
Possess them — Settle upon those parts of their
lands
that are fit for habitation.
Verse 11
[11] The LORD will be terrible unto them: for he will famish
all the gods of the earth; and men shall worship him
every one from his place
even all the isles of the heathen.
Famish — Take away all their sacrifices and drink-offerings.
The gods — Idols of those lands.
From his place — Not only at Jerusalem
but every
where.
Verse 12
[12] Ye Ethiopians also
ye shall be slain by my sword.
By my sword — The Chaldeans are called God's
sword; because God employed them.
Verse 13
[13] And he will stretch out his hand against the north
and
destroy Assyria; and will make Nineveh a desolation
and dry like a wilderness.
He — God.
The north — Assyria
which lay northward of
Judea
and due north from Babylon.
Verse 14
[14] And flocks shall lie down in the midst of her
all the
beasts of the nations: both the cormorant and the bittern shall lodge in the
upper lintels of it; their voice shall sing in the windows; desolation shall be
in the thresholds: for he shall uncover the cedar work.
All the beasts — All sorts of beasts which are
found in those countries.
The bittern — A bird that delights in desolate
places.
Verse 15
[15] This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly
that
said in her heart
I am
and there is none beside me: how is she become a
desolation
a place for beasts to lie down in! every one that passeth by her
shall hiss
and wag his hand.
This — So the prophet triumphs over her.
There is none — None like me
or that can contend
with me.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on Zephaniah》
02 Chapter 2
Verses 1-3
Seek ye the Lord
all ye meek of the earth.
Sin and repentance
the bane and antidote
An exhortation to the men of Judah to repent ere the
Chaldean invaders approach and wreak destruction on their land.
I. Sin exposes man
to ruin. It was sin
in the form of idolatry and gross immorality
that exposed
the Jewish people to the terrible doom that was now hanging over them.
1. The suffering that follows sin is sometimes very terrible. Sin
brings to a people famines
pestilences
wars
hells.
2. The suffering expresses God’s antagonism to sin. “The fierce anger
of the Lord
” or
as Henderson has it
the “burning anger of Jehovah.” The
connection between sin and misery is a beneficent arrangement. It is well that
misery should pursue wrong.
II. That repentance
delivers man from ruin.
1. The preparation for repentance. “Gather yourselves together.” It
is well for sinners in the prospect of their doom to meet and confer concerning
their relations to Almighty God.
2. The nature of repentance. “Seek ye the Lord
all ye meek of the
earth”; or
as Henderson renders it
“Seek ye Jehovah
all ye humble of the
earth.” There are two seekings here.
3. The urgency of repentance. “Before the decree bring forth
before
the day pass as the chaff
before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you
before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you.” (Homilist.)
Seek righteousness
seek
meekness.
True way of seeking God
The prophet defines what the true and rightful way of seeking God
is
and that is
when righteousness is sought
when humility is sought. By
righteousness he understands the same thing as by judgment; as though he had
said
“Advance in a righteous and holy course of life
for God will not forget
your obedience
provided your hearts grow not faint
and ye persevere to the
end.” We hence see that God complains
not only when we obtrude external pomps
and devices
I know not what
as though He might like a child be amused by us;
but also when we do not sincerely devote our life to His service. And he adds
humility to righteousness; for it is difficult even for the very best of men not
to murmur against God when He severely chastises them. We indeed find how much
their own delicacy embitters the minds of men when God appears somewhat severe
with them. Hence the prophet
in order to check all clamours
exhorts the
faithful here to cultivate humility
so that they might bear patiently the
rigour by which God would try them
and might suffer themselves to be ruled by
His hand (1 Peter 5:6). The prophet requires
humility
in order that they might with composed minds wait for the deliverance
which God had promised. They were not in the interval to murmur
nor to give
vent to their own perverse feelings
however severely God might treat them. We
may hence gather a profitable instruction. The prophet does not address here
men who were depraved
and had wholly neglected what was just and right
but he
directs his discourse to the best
the most upright
the most holy: and yet he
shows that they had no other remedy
but humbly and patiently to bear the
chastisement of God. It then follows that no perfection can be found among men
such as can meet the judgment of God. (John Calvin.)
It may be ye shall be hid
in the day of the Lord’s anger.--
Prayer and providence
Zephaniah could not promise the people exemption from the trials
that should come upon them from the Chaldeans. But neither was it possible for
him
or any other
to say how much
in the way of mitigation of those
threatened evils
might be effected by prayer
by effort
by an humble seeking
unto the Lord their God. “It may be”--a theology from which these words should
be excluded
would
if it met with universal acceptance
go far towards turning
the world upside down. It would paralyse all the powers of our religious nature.
It would take from under us all grounds for trusting in a moral providence. Let
certainty
in relation to the Divine Being
be as fixed a thing as you will
I
must have some room left for a peradventure--must be permitted to believe that
there are possibilities in the future of indeterminate issue. This
indeterminateness may be looked at in two different ways.
I. As it bears
upon the principles of a Divine administration. Is the use of such language as
“ it may be
” compatible with that fixed order of procedure by which
it is
commonly assumed
the Almighty governs the world?
1. These words suppose
if they do not directly affirm
the doctrine
of a moral providence; as opposed to the doctrine of fatalism; or of
irresistible necessity. There is a constant
continuous
moral superintendence
over the affairs of men
for moral purposes. God never permits secondary
agencies to go out of His own hands. This view is not more a disclosure of
revelation
than it is an essential element of our first conceptions of an
Infinite Being. On the Christian
showing of what God is
we cannot admit His existence without admitting His
providence also. Of course nothing more is contended for
than the fact of a
special providence overruling the affairs of men. Of the methods of our
preservation
or deliverance
in trying circumstances
we often know nothing.
2. Take the words “it may be
” as against that unchanging fixity of
natural laws
which it is the fashion of a modern philosophy to make the grand
autocratic power in the universe of God. The form of the objection is
that
since cause and effect
in the natural world
are joined together by a nexus of
undeviating certainty
all prayer for the modification of events
occurring in
the order of physical law
is “absurd.” But this not only limits the agency of
the Divine Being in the natural world
but strikes at the root of all our
conceptions of God as a moral governor. God and nature
upon this theory
make
up the universe
and the only relation which God has to nature is to keep the
wondrous machine going. A high and impersonal abstraction governs all things.
Free moral agents
in this apparatus of eternal sequences
there are none
either in relation to God or man. What is the foundation fallacy of this
reasoning? But prayer asks for no violation of any inevitable law of sequence.
It is merely an appeal to Infinite Wisdom to devise some method for our relief.
This is the fault we charge upon the so-called scientific objection. It assumes
that all the events in this world’s history
however intimately affecting man’s
happiness
depend for their accomplishment on physical laws only
rather than
as they do
upon those laws liable to be modified in their operation by the
intervention or volition of moral agents. Just here
where a fixed thing is
intercalated with an unfixed thing
room is left for the putting forth of human
effort
and the offering up of faithful prayer. The assumption is entirely
gratuitous that
in praying against any form of apprehended danger
I expect
the laws of the material world to be suspended
or altered
or put out of
course
in any miraculous way. My prayer only goes upon the supposition that
there are multitudinous agencies in God
which may be employed to turn a
threatened evil aside
or to modify its operation before it reaches me.
II. Consider the
subject in relation to human agency. Or what man may and ought to do towards
the same object.
1. Seek the Lord by earnest prayer.
2. Take care not to stipulate for any particular form of relief. (D.
Moore
M. A.)
The saint’s hiding-place
Notice the matter of the exhortation to the godly
which
is
“To seek the Lord
to seek righteousness
to seek meekness.” The subjects
or persons upon whom this exhortation falls. “The meek of the earth.” And the
motive pressing thereto. “It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s
anger.” Ye shall surely be hidden from the wrath to come
and it may be from
the wrath present.
I. God hath His
days of anger. Take anger properly for a passion
and then there is none in God.
Take anger for the effects and fruits thereof
and so it is not with God as
mercy is. Yet He hath His days of anger. The more excellent a person
the
sooner he is moved to anger. Now there is most excellency in God
and therefore
sin being a contempt of Him
He cannot but be moved to anger. Anger is the
dagger that love wears to save itself
and to hurt all that wrongs the thing
loved: there is infinite love in God
and therefore there must needs be anger
too. God has three houses that He puts men into: an house of instruction
an
house of correction
an house of destruction. It is not in itself unlawful to
be angry
only your anger must be unto reformation
as God’s is. If there be
wrath m God
how infinitely are our souls bound unto Jesus Christ
by whom we
are delivered from the wrath to come
reconciled to God
and made friends to
Him. And being friends
His very wrath and anger are our friends also.
II. In days of
angst
God is very willing to hide
save
and defend His people. God knows how to deliver from danger by danger
from death by death
from misery by misery. Much of the saints’ preservation is
put into the hand of angels. Those that hide the saints are sure to be hidden
by God. Those that keep the word of God’s patience
have a promise to be hidden
by God. Those are sure to be hidden by God in evil times
that fear not the
fears of men. And those that remain green and flourishing in their religion
notwithstanding all the
scorching heats of opposition that do fall on them.
And the “meek of
the earth shall be hidden by God.
III. Though God is
willing to hide His own people in evil times
yet He doth sometimes leave them
at great uncertainties. They have more than a “may be” for their eternal
salvation. But as for our temporal and outward salvation
God doth sometimes
leave His people to a “may be.” God loves to have His people trust to the
goodness of His nature.
IV. When His people
have only a ‘‘may be
” it is their duty to seek unto God. There is no such way
to establish our thoughts as to commit our ways unto God. The text points unto
three things--
1. Seek the Lord Himself
not His goods
but His goodness.
2. Seek righteousness.
3. Seek truth.
V. If any man can
do any good in the day of God’s anger
it is the meek of the earth. Therefore
the text calls on them specially to seek the Lord. The meek have the promise of
the earth. The meek do most honour Christ
the way of Christ
and the Gospel. A meek person
leaves his cause with God and his revenge to Him. The meek person is most fit
for the service of God. Hereby
even your meekness
ye walk as becometh the
Gospel
ye inherit the earth
are made like unto Jesus Christ
have a great
power and credit in heaven for yourselves and others
and shall be hidden in
the evil day. (W. Bridge
M. A.)
Divine discipline
(with chap. 3.
Zephaniah 3:11-12):--The prophet spoke
and in fact it happened that judgment fell; the nations passed
Israel was
chastised; it went into captivity. And there did come back that meek
that
poor
that afflicted people
despised even of the Samaritans--those feeble
Jews. They came back trusting in Jehovah; they laid the foundations of that
piteous and miserable new temple. Its very foundations cause contempt; those
who remember the old temple could but weep. But this new temple was to be
clothed with a glory which the old temple had never known. It was the religion
of humanity that Was to come out from that regenerated and purged people--that
little band of the meek of the earth. Brethren
we speak of poetical justice
and we mean by that generally when we want to see the lines of ideal actions
clear and unblurred. We have to look to our great works of fiction
to some
great drama
or poem
or novel
and there
if they are great of their kind
we
see the ideal lines of Divine judgment
and of human progress
standing out
clear and vivid in that which the imagination of the artist conceives. And the
artist must conceive it for us
and teach us through these ideal lines
because
in the most of our ordinary experience
the lines of Divine action
of
human experience
are blurred and confused in the mixture and confusion of this
common earthly scene. But it is not always so. There are days of the Lord. The
days of the Lord are the moments in history when the ideal issues appear
and
the Divine hand is plain. Such a moment was the judgment and the restoration of
Israel. There have been other such moments in history
like the decay of Spain
like the French Revolution
like the collapse of Napoleon. There are moments in
history when God bares His arms and speaks plainly. It might be so again one
day upon what is proud and exalting in this English nation of ours. Anyway
God
does it. Beyond our sight He will do it
or m our sight from time to time He
does it. That is the Divine method. Always
it is through this discipline
whereby God must single out for progress those who will consent to be chastened
into meekness. But for to-day let us leave again the scene of political and
social history
and trace this method of God again in the individual soul.
There again
the method of Divine discipline
the method whereby we
individual
after individual
are prepared for effective fruitfulness
is this same method
of chastening. One after another
in our pride and our haughtiness
we have to
be chastened into that quality which--it is the very paradox of Divine
justice--is the one really strong and effective quality in the progress of the
human soul
and it is meekness. Disciplined into effective meekness--that is
the verdict which might be written upon the history of every single human soul
which fulfils in any real measure the purpose of God. Englishmen are proud; we
know it. In a certain way we are proud of being proud. Look round about in the
world. What are the spectacles
the strange and overpowering spectacles
which
we behold of the insolence
of human pride? From time to time the record of some millionaire in America or
South Africa or England is laid bare to us--some one who confessedly
and
before the eyes of men
bids defiance to all the laws of mercy
and simply sets
himself to scrape together gold
almost professedly making gold his god
and
trampling under foot the laws of mercy and of justice and of consideration. And
there are smaller men who never rise into note
or come before the public
either in their rise or their catastrophe
who are in their humbler sphere
doing the same thing. Or
look at him
that rich young man
that Superbus
who
feels that the land is made for him. Look at him as he goes out into life with
his preposterous claim for amusement
for luxury
for self-satisfaction
with
the recklessness of his selfish lusts
as he does despite to every law that
ought to bind men in mercy and consideration and purity
because he must
gratify his passion at all costs in that claim for amusement
in that almost
riotous estimation of himself; so that
as one looks at him in his arrogance
one wonders why God stands it
and why a very little thunderbolt is not sent about
its business to despatch him there in the impotence of his vanity. God does not
strike them with thunderbolts; God has other methods. He is the Father of each
one. In slow and patient silence God waits; God provides for them His judgment.
It waits upon them; it will come at last in this world
so that we can see it;
or beyond this world
where it is dark to our vision
God will judge them. But
the question is this--When the judgment falls
how will it strike? Surely they
will know that God is God
they will know at the last it is the fool that saith
in his heart
“There is no God.” Yes
they will know that they were fools. But
the question is
in what disposition of mind? Will it be to them mere
punish-meat
mere retribution
or will it be to them purging
healing
disciplining chastisement? That is the question. No question so far as the
intention of God is concerned; in God’s intention these judgments are for
chastisement
for discipline
for recovery. But there is a soul that has worked
itself into a stubbornness which will not bend
and perforce can only be
broken. That is the question. Pharaoh is in the old story raised up in the
scene of human history
to stand as the type of the soul that must be broken
because it will not bend. But
on the other hand
our Bible
Old and New
Testament
is full of the gracious pictures of those whom the chastisement of
God has slowly
and at last
disciplined into that effective meekness which is
the one charm
the beauty of the children of God. Moses
brought up in all the
wisdom of the Egyptians
and in the splendid opportunities of that court--we
read of him how
in the pride of strong manhood
he went out to be the
deliverer of his people. He met with nothing but rebuffs. “Who made thee a
leader and deliverer?” and he fled alarmed and baffled
and
in the back side
of the desert
through the long discipline of silence
away from all political
interests
Moses learned the lesson of meekness
and he goes back
that old
call of God not withdrawn
now effective because meek. Moses was very meek. “O
Lord
I am not eloquent
neither now nor since. Thou hast spoken unto Thy
servant.” Pass to the New Testament. Think of those words to Peter
“When thou
wast young
thou girdest thyself; when thou shalt be old
others shall gird
thee
and carry thee whither thou wouldest not.” It is the record of experience
of every one. Limitations crowd in upon us. There are multitudes of things
which in our hateful arrogance we thought we would do. We find we cannot do
them. Limitations close in upon us--hindrances
disappointments
sufferings
pain. How are we to bear it all? Are we to become all the more querulous
resentful
irritating
or is each stroke of the Divine discipline to be the
learning to us all a lesson
so that all the more
stroke after stroke
the
soul learning its limitations
is forced into the line of Divine
correspondence
and made meek is made effective? So it was with the proud and
the impulsive Peter
so that that late writing of his
that epistle of his
is
full
as hardly any other book of the New Testament is full
of the rich power
of the spirit of meekness. Or Saul the Pharisee
yielding at last with one blow
to the Divine claim
and becoming
for all that Jewish pride of his
once and
for ever the slave of the meek Jesus. These are the meek of the earth; because
they are meek
therefore
in the kingdom of God
the effective--the men who do
fruitful things
the men whose work lasts because they are the followers of Him
who was meek and lowly in heart. Jesus had no pride to be overcome. What are
you expecting of this human life of yours? It matters so much what we expect.
Pleasure
success? Ah
yes! There is in this human heart of ours an
inextinguishable thirst for happiness. And it is there
God-given. Do not listen
to those altruistic philosophers of our modern time who would tell us that to
have care for ourselves is simple and radical selfishness. Nay
the Bible
throughout is true to what I call the ineradicable instinct of the human heart.
God made us
and because He made us we are made for happiness
we are made to
realise ourselves. But the question is
How? Look for happiness
make it your
aim
hunt for pleasure
and you are baffled. It is by the law of indirectness
that we are to realise happiness. He that sayeth his life
seeketh his own
life
he shall lose it; he that loseth it
he shall save it. That is the law.
Here in this world we are set to gain character. So we are to expect
discipline. It is one of the simple laws of human life
character develops by
discipline
develops through pain. “Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.”
Therefore this is the point
a point of supreme importance when you come to
think about your life. Am I
I as I am to-day
I being the sort of man I am
am
I yielding myself so that God by disciplining me can make me meek and
in
meekness
effective? That very thing which I have always said is the one thing
I could not stand
when it comes
as it probably does come
if I set myself too
much to rebel against it--when it comes
how do I take it? Have I that measure
of spiritual insight and thoughtfulness which enables me to say
“This is just
that moulding
graving tool which is so necessary to rub off that sharp angle
to blot out that dark stain
to do this or that or the other necessary work in
my character? “ Do I regard it as the trenchant treatment of the surgeon who is to
again make me sound? Humiliation is the way to humility. Learn the lesson which
the humiliation contains for us
to become the wiser man
the more docile while
not the less resolute. That is the discipline of God--point by point
step by
step
biting after biting of the tool
smiting after smiting of the hammer. So
it is
moulding after moulding of the Divine hand
we are to be brought into
shape. Now
I say it
there is not a day of our life in which it does not make
a real vital difference whether we have had this expectation in our will
our
intelligence
our heart
so that when the blow
little or great
comes
the
disappointment
be it never so trivial
it may teach us the lesson. The little
humiliation may come on its way and speed on as a messenger which has fulfilled
its obligation and done its duty. For it has taught us something
and we go to
bed something wiser men and women than we got up in the morning. There is
hardly a department of life in which there are not great and vital changes
which are needed. Yes
but are we fit to do them? That is the question. Perhaps
we have willingness
but have we what is a part of meekness--patience? Do we
arrive with our enthusiasm
our ideal enthusiasm
and then shrink altogether
from the task of
drudgery? Because you know there are only two qualities by which anything
finally effective can be done--enthusiasm and drudgery
and they are no good
apart. Or
is it vanity? Yes
I offered myself to work on that particular
committee
I offered myself to do that good job which surely was for the
bettering of mankind. But then I thought that I was to be secretary
or I was
to be put into the chair
and somebody else who surely had no better claim than
I was put there. Or
is it the refusal of pain? There it is
the pain
the
ugliness
the dirt
and squalor
and to do anything effective I must be in
contact with the pain and the dirt and the ugliness and the squalor. I must not
be hiding myself from my own flesh. But I shrink from it
I think I cannot bear
it
and the task is undone
and the Kingdom of God makes not the progress it
might make because I am not with the meek and the patient
with the sorrowful
and the suffering. Or
is it prayerlessness? I have my schemes
my plans
but I
do not keep myself in correspondence with God. It is my own pride that guides
me
my own ideas
my own schemes. The question is
whether in the larger or
less sphere we will mould
mould to the Divine hand
or whether we will be that
obstinate stuff
that moral character that will not mould
and which becomes
the vessel of wrath
the vessel which the Divine Potter
after patient trying
finds unmalleable
and at the last must cast aside as of a stuff that will not
make under the Divine hand. That is it
the Divine Potter would mould you. And
is there anything to the spiritual imagination so beautiful
anything so lovely
to think about
as the discipline of the soul
conscious of the hand of God
upon it
and
for all its occasional wilfulness and sins and faults
ever
coming back to be moulded according to the plan and will of the Divine Potter
according to the love of our Father
Who chastens us into effective meekness
that at the last we may share in the glory of His kingdom as things that have
realised their end in that fruitfulness which belongs to the meek? That is the
consciousness which every Christian soul is sooner or later meant to have. (Bishop
Gore.)
Verses 1-3
Seek ye the Lord
all ye meek of the earth.
Sin and repentance
the bane and antidote
An exhortation to the men of Judah to repent ere the
Chaldean invaders approach and wreak destruction on their land.
I. Sin exposes man
to ruin. It was sin
in the form of idolatry and gross immorality
that exposed
the Jewish people to the terrible doom that was now hanging over them.
1. The suffering that follows sin is sometimes very terrible. Sin
brings to a people famines
pestilences
wars
hells.
2. The suffering expresses God’s antagonism to sin. “The fierce anger
of the Lord
” or
as Henderson has it
the “burning anger of Jehovah.” The
connection between sin and misery is a beneficent arrangement. It is well that
misery should pursue wrong.
II. That repentance
delivers man from ruin.
1. The preparation for repentance. “Gather yourselves together.” It
is well for sinners in the prospect of their doom to meet and confer concerning
their relations to Almighty God.
2. The nature of repentance. “Seek ye the Lord
all ye meek of the
earth”; or
as Henderson renders it
“Seek ye Jehovah
all ye humble of the
earth.” There are two seekings here.
3. The urgency of repentance. “Before the decree bring forth
before the
day pass as the chaff
before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you
before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you.” (Homilist.)
Seek righteousness
seek
meekness.
True way of seeking God
The prophet defines what the true and rightful way of seeking God
is
and that is
when righteousness is sought
when humility is sought. By
righteousness he understands the same thing as by judgment; as though he had
said
“Advance in a righteous and holy course of life
for God will not forget
your obedience
provided your hearts grow not faint
and ye persevere to the
end.” We hence see that God complains
not only when we obtrude external pomps
and devices
I know not what
as though He might like a child be amused by us;
but also when we do not sincerely devote our life to His service. And he adds
humility to righteousness; for it is difficult even for the very best of men
not to murmur against God when He severely chastises them. We indeed find how
much their own delicacy embitters the minds of men when God appears somewhat
severe with them. Hence the prophet
in order to check all clamours
exhorts
the faithful here to cultivate humility
so that they might bear patiently the
rigour by which God would try them
and might suffer themselves to be ruled by
His hand (1 Peter 5:6). The prophet requires
humility
in order that they might with composed minds wait for the deliverance
which God had promised. They were not in the interval to murmur
nor to give
vent to their own perverse feelings
however severely God might treat them. We
may hence gather a profitable instruction. The prophet does not address here
men who were depraved
and had wholly neglected what was just and right
but he
directs his discourse to the best
the most upright
the most holy: and yet he
shows that they had no other remedy
but humbly and patiently to bear the
chastisement of God. It then follows that no perfection can be found among men
such as can meet the judgment of God. (John Calvin.)
It may be ye shall be hid
in the day of the Lord’s anger.--
Prayer and providence
Zephaniah could not promise the people exemption from the trials
that should come upon them from the Chaldeans. But neither was it possible for
him
or any other
to say how much
in the way of mitigation of those
threatened evils
might be effected by prayer
by effort
by an humble seeking
unto the Lord their God. “It may be”--a theology from which these words should
be excluded
would
if it met with universal acceptance
go far towards turning
the world upside down. It would paralyse all the powers of our religious
nature. It would take from under us all grounds for trusting in a moral
providence. Let certainty
in relation to the Divine Being
be as fixed a thing
as you will
I must have some room left for a peradventure--must be permitted
to believe that there are possibilities in the future of indeterminate issue.
This indeterminateness may be looked at in two different ways.
I. As it bears
upon the principles of a Divine administration. Is the use of such language as
“ it may be
” compatible with that fixed order of procedure by which
it is
commonly assumed
the Almighty governs the world?
1. These words suppose
if they do not directly affirm
the doctrine
of a moral providence; as opposed to the doctrine of fatalism; or of
irresistible necessity. There is a constant
continuous
moral superintendence
over the affairs of men
for moral purposes. God never permits secondary
agencies to go out of His own hands. This view is not more a disclosure of
revelation
than it is an essential element of our first conceptions of an
Infinite Being. On the Christian
showing of what God is
we cannot admit His existence without admitting His
providence also. Of course nothing more is contended for
than the fact of a
special providence overruling the affairs of men. Of the methods of our
preservation
or deliverance
in trying circumstances
we often know nothing.
2. Take the words “it may be
” as against that unchanging fixity of
natural laws
which it is the fashion of a modern philosophy to make the grand
autocratic power in the universe of God. The form of the objection is
that
since cause and effect
in the natural world
are joined together by a nexus of
undeviating certainty
all prayer for the modification of events
occurring in
the order of physical law
is “absurd.” But this not only limits the agency of
the Divine Being in the natural world
but strikes at the root of all our
conceptions of God as a moral governor. God and nature
upon this theory
make
up the universe
and the only relation which God has to nature is to keep the
wondrous machine going. A high and impersonal abstraction governs all things.
Free moral agents
in this apparatus of eternal sequences
there are none
either in relation to God or man. What is the foundation fallacy of this
reasoning? But prayer asks for no violation of any inevitable law of sequence.
It is merely an appeal to Infinite Wisdom to devise some method for our relief.
This is the fault we charge upon the so-called scientific objection. It assumes
that all the events in this world’s history
however intimately affecting man’s
happiness
depend for their accomplishment on physical laws only
rather than
as they do
upon those laws liable to be modified in their operation by the
intervention or volition of moral agents. Just here
where a fixed thing is
intercalated with an unfixed thing
room is left for the putting forth of human
effort
and the offering up of faithful prayer. The assumption is entirely
gratuitous that
in praying against any form of apprehended danger
I expect
the laws of the material world to be suspended
or altered
or put out of
course
in any miraculous way. My prayer only goes upon the supposition that
there are multitudinous agencies in God
which may be employed to turn a
threatened evil aside
or to modify its operation before it reaches me.
II. Consider the
subject in relation to human agency. Or what man may and ought to do towards
the same object.
1. Seek the Lord by earnest prayer.
2. Take care not to stipulate for any particular form of relief. (D.
Moore
M. A.)
The saint’s hiding-place
Notice the matter of the exhortation to the godly
which
is
“To seek the Lord
to seek righteousness
to seek meekness.” The subjects
or persons upon whom this exhortation falls. “The meek of the earth.” And the
motive pressing thereto. “It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s
anger.” Ye shall surely be hidden from the wrath to come
and it may be from
the wrath present.
I. God hath His
days of anger. Take anger properly for a passion
and then there is none in
God. Take anger for the effects and fruits thereof
and so it is not with God
as mercy is. Yet He hath His days of anger. The more excellent a person
the
sooner he is moved to anger. Now there is most excellency in God
and therefore
sin being a contempt of Him
He cannot but be moved to anger. Anger is the
dagger that love wears to save itself
and to hurt all that wrongs the thing
loved: there is infinite love in God
and therefore there must needs be anger
too. God has three houses that He puts men into: an house of instruction
an
house of correction
an house of destruction. It is not in itself unlawful to
be angry
only your anger must be unto reformation
as God’s is. If there be
wrath m God
how infinitely are our souls bound unto Jesus Christ
by whom we
are delivered from the wrath to come
reconciled to God
and made friends to
Him. And being friends
His very wrath and anger are our friends also.
II. In days of
angst
God is very willing to hide
save
and defend His people. God knows how to deliver from danger by danger
from death by death
from misery by misery. Much of the saints’ preservation is
put into the hand of angels. Those that hide the saints are sure to be hidden
by God. Those that keep the word of God’s patience
have a promise to be hidden
by God. Those are sure to be hidden by God in evil times
that fear not the
fears of men. And those that remain green and flourishing in their religion
notwithstanding all the
scorching heats of opposition that do fall on them.
And the “meek of
the earth shall be hidden by God.
III. Though God is
willing to hide His own people in evil times
yet He doth sometimes leave them
at great uncertainties. They have more than a “may be” for their eternal
salvation. But as for our temporal and outward salvation
God doth sometimes
leave His people to a “may be.” God loves to have His people trust to the
goodness of His nature.
IV. When His people
have only a ‘‘may be
” it is their duty to seek unto God. There is no such way
to establish our thoughts as to commit our ways unto God. The text points unto
three things--
1. Seek the Lord Himself
not His goods
but His goodness.
2. Seek righteousness.
3. Seek truth.
V. If any man can
do any good in the day of God’s anger
it is the meek of the earth. Therefore
the text calls on them specially to seek the Lord. The meek have the promise of
the earth. The meek do most honour Christ
the way of Christ
and the Gospel. A meek person
leaves his cause with God and his revenge to Him. The meek person is most fit
for the service of God. Hereby
even your meekness
ye walk as becometh the
Gospel
ye inherit the earth
are made like unto Jesus Christ
have a great
power and credit in heaven for yourselves and others
and shall be hidden in
the evil day. (W. Bridge
M. A.)
Divine discipline
(with chap. 3.
Zephaniah 3:11-12):--The prophet spoke
and in fact it happened that judgment fell; the nations passed
Israel was
chastised; it went into captivity. And there did come back that meek
that
poor
that afflicted people
despised even of the Samaritans--those feeble
Jews. They came back trusting in Jehovah; they laid the foundations of that
piteous and miserable new temple. Its very foundations cause contempt; those
who remember the old temple could but weep. But this new temple was to be
clothed with a glory which the old temple had never known. It was the religion
of humanity that Was to come out from that regenerated and purged people--that
little band of the meek of the earth. Brethren
we speak of poetical justice
and we mean by that generally when we want to see the lines of ideal actions
clear and unblurred. We have to look to our great works of fiction
to some
great drama
or poem
or novel
and there
if they are great of their kind
we
see the ideal lines of Divine judgment
and of human progress
standing out
clear and vivid in that which the imagination of the artist conceives. And the
artist must conceive it for us
and teach us through these ideal lines
because
in the most of our ordinary experience
the lines of Divine action
of
human experience
are blurred and confused in the mixture and confusion of this
common earthly scene. But it is not always so. There are days of the Lord. The
days of the Lord are the moments in history when the ideal issues appear
and
the Divine hand is plain. Such a moment was the judgment and the restoration of
Israel. There have been other such moments in history
like the decay of Spain
like the French Revolution
like the collapse of Napoleon. There are moments in
history when God bares His arms and speaks plainly. It might be so again one day
upon what is proud and exalting in this English nation of ours. Anyway
God
does it. Beyond our sight He will do it
or m our sight from time to time He
does it. That is the Divine method. Always
it is through this discipline
whereby God must single out for progress those who will consent to be chastened
into meekness. But for to-day let us leave again the scene of political and
social history
and trace this method of God again in the individual soul.
There again
the method of Divine discipline
the method whereby we
individual
after individual
are prepared for effective fruitfulness
is this same method
of chastening. One after another
in our pride and our haughtiness
we have to
be chastened into that quality which--it is the very paradox of Divine
justice--is the one really strong and effective quality in the progress of the
human soul
and it is meekness. Disciplined into effective meekness--that is
the verdict which might be written upon the history of every single human soul
which fulfils in any real measure the purpose of God. Englishmen are proud; we
know it. In a certain way we are proud of being proud. Look round about in the
world. What are the spectacles
the strange and overpowering spectacles
which
we behold of the insolence
of human pride? From time to time the record of some millionaire in America or
South Africa or England is laid bare to us--some one who confessedly
and
before the eyes of men
bids defiance to all the laws of mercy
and simply sets
himself to scrape together gold
almost professedly making gold his god
and
trampling under foot the laws of mercy and of justice and of consideration. And
there are smaller men who never rise into note
or come before the public
either in their rise or their catastrophe
who are in their humbler sphere
doing the same thing. Or
look at him
that rich young man
that Superbus
who
feels that the land is made for him. Look at him as he goes out into life with
his preposterous claim for amusement
for luxury
for self-satisfaction
with the
recklessness of his selfish lusts
as he does despite to every law that ought
to bind men in mercy and consideration and purity
because he must gratify his
passion at all costs in that claim for amusement
in that almost riotous
estimation of himself; so that
as one looks at him in his arrogance
one
wonders why God stands it
and why a very little thunderbolt is not sent about
its business to despatch him there in the impotence of his vanity. God does not
strike them with thunderbolts; God has other methods. He is the Father of each
one. In slow and patient silence God waits; God provides for them His judgment.
It waits upon them; it will come at last in this world
so that we can see it;
or beyond this world
where it is dark to our vision
God will judge them. But
the question is this--When the judgment falls
how will it strike? Surely they
will know that God is God
they will know at the last it is the fool that saith
in his heart
“There is no God.” Yes
they will know that they were fools. But
the question is
in what disposition of mind? Will it be to them mere
punish-meat
mere retribution
or will it be to them purging
healing
disciplining chastisement? That is the question. No question so far as the
intention of God is concerned; in God’s intention these judgments are for
chastisement
for discipline
for recovery. But there is a soul that has worked
itself into a stubbornness which will not bend
and perforce can only be
broken. That is the question. Pharaoh is in the old story raised up in the
scene of human history
to stand as the type of the soul that must be broken
because it will not bend. But
on the other hand
our Bible
Old and New
Testament
is full of the gracious pictures of those whom the chastisement of
God has slowly
and at last
disciplined into that effective meekness which is
the one charm
the beauty of the children of God. Moses
brought up in all the
wisdom of the Egyptians
and in the splendid opportunities of that court--we
read of him how
in the pride of strong manhood
he went out to be the
deliverer of his people. He met with nothing but rebuffs. “Who made thee a
leader and deliverer?” and he fled alarmed and baffled
and
in the back side
of the desert
through the long discipline of silence
away from all political interests
Moses learned the lesson of meekness
and he goes back
that old call of God
not withdrawn
now effective because meek. Moses was very meek. “O Lord
I am
not eloquent
neither now nor since. Thou hast spoken unto Thy servant.” Pass
to the New Testament. Think of those words to Peter
“When thou wast young
thou girdest thyself; when thou shalt be old
others shall gird thee
and carry
thee whither thou wouldest not.” It is the record of experience of every one.
Limitations crowd in upon us. There are multitudes of things which in our
hateful arrogance we thought we would do. We find we cannot do them.
Limitations close in upon us--hindrances
disappointments
sufferings
pain.
How are we to bear it all? Are we to become all the more querulous
resentful
irritating
or is each stroke of the Divine discipline to be the learning to us
all a lesson
so that all the more
stroke after stroke
the soul learning its
limitations
is forced into the line of Divine correspondence
and made meek is
made effective? So it was with the proud and the impulsive Peter
so that that
late writing of his
that epistle of his
is full
as hardly any other book of
the New Testament is full
of the rich power of the spirit of meekness. Or Saul
the Pharisee
yielding at last with one blow to the Divine claim
and becoming
for all that Jewish pride of his
once and for ever the slave of the meek
Jesus. These are the meek of the earth; because they are meek
therefore
in
the kingdom of God
the effective--the men who do fruitful things
the men
whose work lasts because they are the followers of Him who was meek and lowly
in heart. Jesus had no pride to be overcome. What are you expecting of this
human life of yours? It matters so much what we expect. Pleasure
success? Ah
yes! There is in this human heart of ours an inextinguishable thirst for
happiness. And it is there
God-given. Do not listen to those altruistic
philosophers of our modern time who would tell us that to have care for
ourselves is simple and radical selfishness. Nay
the Bible throughout is true
to what I call the ineradicable instinct of the human heart. God made us
and
because He made us we are made for happiness
we are made to realise ourselves.
But the question is
How? Look for happiness
make it your aim
hunt for
pleasure
and you are baffled. It is by the law of indirectness that we are to
realise happiness. He that sayeth his life
seeketh his own life
he shall lose
it; he that loseth it
he shall save it. That is the law. Here in this world we
are set to gain character. So we are to expect discipline. It is one of the
simple laws of human life
character develops by discipline
develops through
pain. “Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.” Therefore this is the point
a
point of supreme importance when you come to think about your life. Am I
I as
I am to-day
I being the sort of man I am
am I yielding myself so that God by
disciplining me can make me meek and
in meekness
effective? That very thing
which I have always said is the one thing I could not stand
when it comes
as
it probably does come
if I set myself too much to rebel against it--when it
comes
how do I take it? Have I that measure of spiritual insight and
thoughtfulness which enables me to say
“This is just that moulding
graving tool
which is so necessary to rub off that sharp angle
to blot out that dark stain
to do this or that or the other necessary work in my character? “ Do I regard
it as the trenchant treatment of the surgeon who is to again make me sound?
Humiliation is the way to humility. Learn the lesson which the humiliation
contains for us
to become the wiser man
the more docile while not the less
resolute. That is the discipline of God--point by point
step by step
biting
after biting of the tool
smiting after smiting of the hammer. So it is
moulding after moulding of the Divine hand
we are to be brought into shape.
Now
I say it
there is not a day of our life in which it does not make a real
vital difference whether we have had this expectation in our will
our
intelligence
our heart
so that when the blow
little or great
comes
the
disappointment
be it never so trivial
it may teach us the lesson. The little
humiliation may come on its way and speed on as a messenger which has fulfilled
its obligation and done its duty. For it has taught us something
and we go to
bed something wiser men and women than we got up in the morning. There is
hardly a department of life in which there are not great and vital changes
which are needed. Yes
but are we fit to do them? That is the question. Perhaps
we have willingness
but have we what is a part of meekness--patience? Do we
arrive with our enthusiasm
our ideal enthusiasm
and then shrink altogether
from the task of
drudgery? Because you know there are only two qualities by which anything
finally effective can be done--enthusiasm and drudgery
and they are no good
apart. Or
is it vanity? Yes
I offered myself to work on that particular
committee
I offered myself to do that good job which surely was for the
bettering of mankind. But then I thought that I was to be secretary
or I was
to be put into the chair
and somebody else who surely had no better claim than
I was put there. Or
is it the refusal of pain? There it is
the pain
the
ugliness
the dirt
and squalor
and to do anything effective I must be in
contact with the pain and the dirt and the ugliness and the squalor. I must not
be hiding myself from my own flesh. But I shrink from it
I think I cannot bear
it
and the task is undone
and the Kingdom of God makes not the progress it
might make because I am not with the meek and the patient
with the sorrowful
and the suffering. Or
is it prayerlessness? I have my schemes
my plans
but I
do not keep myself in correspondence with God. It is my own pride that guides
me
my own ideas
my own schemes. The question is
whether in the larger or
less sphere we will mould
mould to the Divine hand
or whether we will be that
obstinate stuff
that moral character that will not mould
and which becomes
the vessel of wrath
the vessel which the Divine Potter
after patient trying
finds unmalleable
and at the last must cast aside as of a stuff that will not
make under the Divine hand. That is it
the Divine Potter would mould you. And
is there anything to the spiritual imagination so beautiful
anything so lovely
to think about
as the discipline of the soul
conscious of the hand of God
upon it
and
for all its occasional wilfulness and sins and faults
ever
coming back to be moulded according to the plan and will of the Divine Potter
according to the love of our Father
Who chastens us into effective meekness
that at the last we may share in the glory of His kingdom as things that have
realised their end in that fruitfulness which belongs to the meek? That is the
consciousness which every Christian soul is sooner or later meant to have. (Bishop
Gore.)
Verses 4-15
Verses 4-7
For Gaza shall be forsaken.
The sinner’s baleful influence
and God’s disposal of all
I. The calamities
falling upon one sinner often involve others. The ruin of the Hebrew nation
would be most calamitous to the Philistine cities
and indeed to the
neighbouring States. It is so--
1. With nations.
2. With individuals.
This shows--
II. That the lot of
man is at the disposal of almighty god. “And the sea coast shall be dwellings
and cottages for shepherds
and folds for flocks. And the coast shall be for
the remnant of the house of Judah; they shall feed thereupon: in the houses of
Ashkelon shall they lie down in the evening: for the Lord their God shall visit
them
and turn away their captivity.” Here the Almighty is represented as
arranging the future home and circumstances of the remnant of the house of
Judah. Though we are free
and are conscious of our freedom
we are at the
disposal of One above us. He has appointed--
1. Our place in the world. He has set bounds to our habitation “that
we cannot pass.”
2. Our period in the world. “My times are in Thy hand.” We are often
tempted to imagine that chance rules us. But amidst all this feeling of
contingency and over all there is the ruling plan of the Beneficent God. (Homilist.)
Verses 8-10
I have heard the reproach of Moab.
The persecution of the good
I. That good men
are often subject to annoyances from the ungodly world. “I have heard the
reproach [abuse] of Moab
and the revilings of the children of Ammon
whereby
they have reproached My people [abused My nation]
and magnified themselves
against their border.” These people
the Moabites and the Ammonites
were
constantly annoying and abusing the chosen people. In the time of Moses
Balak
the king of the Moabites
sought to destroy the Israelites by means of Balaam’s
curses (Numbers 22:1-41.). And in the time of the
Judges
both peoples endeavoured to oppress Israel ( 3:12; 10:7). The charge here probably refers to
the hostile attitude assumed by both tribes at all times towards the people of
God. Both Isaiah and Jeremiah charged them with annoying them (Isaiah 16:6; Jeremiah 48:29). The hostile conduct of
Moab and Ammon towards Israel is only a specimen and an illustration of the
antagonism of wicked men towards the truly pious. They “reproach” them
they
charge them with superstition
fanaticism
cant
hypocrisy
etc. The best men
the men of whom the world is not worthy
are always persecuted.
II. That these
annoyances escape not the notice of God. “I have heard the reproach.”
1. God’s attention to the minute concerns of human life.
2. God’s special interest in His people (Jeremiah 23:23).
III. That God will
not fail to chastise the authors of such annoyances. “Therefore as I live
saith the Lord of hosts
the God of Israel
surely Moab shall be as Sodom
and
the children of Ammon as Gomorrah
even the breeding of nettles
and saltpits
and a perpetual desolation.” Mark--
1. The doom of those reproachers. They shall be as Sodom and
Gomorrah.
2. The cause of their doom. “This they shall have for their pride.” (Homilist.)
Verse 11
And men shall worship Him.
Good things in the future
I. The destruction
of idolatry. You may burn up all heathen temples and leave idolatry as rampant
as ever.
II. The advancement
of true worship. “And men shall worship Him
every one from his place
even all
the isles of the heathen.” Observe--
1. The object of true worship. “Men shall worship Him
”--that is
Jehovah. Him
not it--not the universe
but the Infinite Personality that created
it.
2. The scene of true worship. “Every one from his place.” Wherever he
is. He need not go to any particular scene--to temple
chapel
or cathedral.
3. The extent of true worship. “Even all the isles of the heathen.”
What a glorious future awaits this world! (Homilist.)
Verses 13-15
He will stretch out His hand against the north.
National pride and national ruin
Two facts are suggested--
I. That men are
often prone to pride themselves on the greatness of their country. The men of
the city of Nineveh--the capital of Assyria--were proud of their nation. There
was much in the city of Nineveh to account for
if not to justify
the exultant
spirit of its population. It was the metropolis of a vast empire; it was a city
60 miles in compass
it had walls 100 feet high
and so thick and strong that
three chariots could be driven abreast on them; it had 1500 massive towers.
Italy
Austria
Germany
America
England
each says in its spirit
“I am
and
there is none beside me.” This spirit of national boasting is unjustifiable.
There is nothing
in a nation of which it should be proud
except moral excellence. On the
contrary
how much ignorance
sensuality
worldliness
intolerance
impiety
that should humble us in the dust. It is moreover a foolish spirit. It is a
check to true national progress
and its haughty swaggerings tend to irritate
other countries.
II. That the
greatest country must sooner or later fall to ruin. “He will stretch out His
hand against the north
and destroy Assyria.” “Flocks shall lie down in the
midst of her
” etc. Not only a receptacle for beasts
but a derision to
travellers. “Every one that passeth by her shall hiss
and wag his hand.” This
is the fate that awaits all the nations under heaven
even the greatest. (Homilist.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》