Unveiling Zephaniah: A Journey Through Judgment and Hope

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Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

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My name is Pastor Josh and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

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I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.

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Now come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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Thankfully, with the advent of the Internet and all that, you can go back and watch those.

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And I encourage you to go back if you missed any of those and study through that book of the Bible.

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

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

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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.

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Even though we know that all scripture is given by inspiration of God.

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Sometimes we tend to skip over passages of scripture, or sometimes the smaller books of the Bible get lost in the shuffle.

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And so we are going to study a book that sometimes gets overlooked, and that is the book of Zephaniah.

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

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Now this is a sore drill.

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How many of you can find Zephaniah quickly?

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It would be hard.

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It's hard.

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It's in there.

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

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I'm just kidding.

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It's okay.

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But you can get that fast.

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Zephaniah.

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

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Okay.

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

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

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Sometimes you get to the minor prophets, and when we use that phrase, minor prophets, we're not talking about that.

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

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

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So this is a smaller book of the Bible.

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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.

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

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

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Zephaniah is a book of the Bible written by a prophet named, you guessed it, Zephaniah.

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Okay.

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

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

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

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

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And so that took place between 635 and 625 BC.

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So this is happening about 600 years before Jesus.

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And so this is obviously before the new testament.

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Some of you are like, come on.

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I knew that, pastor.

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I can't take anything for granted.

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So I'm setting up the context for you.

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It's written specifically to the people that were in the southern kingdom named Judah.

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Okay?

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Judah was where Jerusalem was located, if you remember, Israel split, and there was the northern kingdom, which was considered to be Israel.

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That was the name.

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

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

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

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And so Judah was the last remnant before the complete overthrow of the babylonian kingdom.

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So this is a book of the Bible written by Zephaniah the prophet between 635 and 625 BC.

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

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It's important to know that his message is a message of judgment, God's judgment upon sin.

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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.

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

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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.

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And really, frankly, all of us deserve punishment.

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So how can we, as believers today, understand the relationship between God's love and his justice, his grace and his holiness?

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We're going to talk through that here.

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Now, there's some attributes of God that we have to understand before we talk about his judgment, right?

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My judgment is limited because I am flawed.

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And so I don't know if you guys have dealt with your children this way or maybe I was a teacher.

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

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

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I'd say, hey, stop talking.

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It wasn't me talking.

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And I might have misheard.

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

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The person pushes somebody and they push him back.

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And I only see the person pushing back, and I get upset, and I go, hey, you're in trouble, right?

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

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

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

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His defining character trait is his holiness.

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And so when God judges, he justly judges those that need to be condemned for their sins.

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

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And so let's look at verse number one.

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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.

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And we're going to see why.

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We are going to be told about his genealogy, and then we're going to see the setting.

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Okay?

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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.

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That's Hezekiah, or Hezekiah in the days of Josiah, the son of Ammon, the king of Judah.

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

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The first thing I wanna point out is the first phrase there, the word of the Lord.

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This is not the word of Zephaniah.

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This is not his opinion.

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This is not his political persuasion.

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This is not his feelings.

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This is the word of the Lord.

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You have to understand, at this time frame, the way that God spoke to his people was through the prophet, right?

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So it's thus saith the Lord.

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So it's not Zephaniah's opinion.

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It's God's opinion.

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It's God's truth coming through Zephaniah.

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They didn't have the complete scope of scripture.

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Okay?

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So they didn't have it all complete.

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And so what would happen is Zephaniah would come and he would say, thus saith the Lord.

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And then he would be speaking for God.

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Now, we know today that we have the revealed word, complete word, of God.

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And so if I got up here tonight and I said, okay, this is what the Bible says, but thus saith the Lord.

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

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And number two, you should say that's dangerous, because the Bible says not to add or subtract from the completion of the word.

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So in this case, when Zephaniah says something here, he's Speaking for God.

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

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So the word of the Lord which came unto Zephaniah, and then we go through his genealogy.

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

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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.

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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.

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So Zephaniah is unusual because most commentators would say that he is from royal lineage, descending from the godly king Hezekiah.

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And so we also see another individual mentioned, Josiah.

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Most of you know Josiah.

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

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And so Judah was overseen by Josiah.

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

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And I hope you know that story right.

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They found the scriptures.

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Josiah told them to read the scriptures.

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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.

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

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

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

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But basically what we're going to see is that the judgment was just delayed in this time.

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So Zephaniah was likely written before the revival happened, early on in the reign of Josiah there in Judah.

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

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And I don't want to get too intellectual here for you this evening, or academic, but I do need you to understand this.

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You have nine that are pre exilic, meaning prior to the exile, that they went to Babylon and all that.

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And then you have the three posts, okay?

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The three that happened after.

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

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Okay?

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

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So he quotes a lot of other prophets.

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He's essentially rehashing a lot of what's already been said with the minor prophets.

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But ultimately, he's gonna be preaching judgment.

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So let's look at verse number two.

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He says, I will utterly consume.

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

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He's speaking for God.

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

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And it says this, I will utterly consume all things from off the land, saith the Lord.

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

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Okay.

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You know, sometimes they tell you it's how you start and how you finish that matters.

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Well, we see how Zephaniah starts.

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He doesn't come in and give any frills.

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He just says, hey, look, God is going to consume all things from off the land.

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And so in this case, we know that KING Josiah inherited a corrupt nation from his father, AmmOn, and from his grandfather Manasseh.

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And so this isn't God just coming down on a whim and just saying, I don't like you guys today.

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This is a longstanding culture of idolatry and evil.

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

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

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So he says, I will utterly consume all things.

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And so this speaks of a complete judgment for the sins of the people here in Judah.

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

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I will consume the fowls of the heaven, the fishes of the sea, and the stumbling blocks with the wicked.

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

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

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He is serious about their rebellion.

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And God speaks here to his holy justice.

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And this is something that as christians, we really need to understand that God is a loving goddess, and we should preach that.

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

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

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

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

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And so in God's defining character trait of his holiness, he must judge.

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He must judge evil.

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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.

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

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Who is God going to specifically judge verse number four, I will also stretch out mine hand upon Judah.

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Now, this is.

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You might skip over that.

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

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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.

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

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It's easy.

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Sometimes.

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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.

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

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Right.

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Sometimes it's easy to disassociate ourselves from the conviction of the message.

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And so God is being very clear here, saying, no, this isn't just a vague judgment on the world.

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

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And we're going to see that there were a lot of people that were living in complacency in Judah at this point.

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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.

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Today in our society, there were people that were basically overlooking God's word.

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They were coming to a place in their life where they felt like they were worshiping God, but they were worshiping idols.

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They were worshipping Baal and Moloch.

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

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

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So this is God personalizing the message to the hearer.

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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.

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This is our problem.

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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.

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But really, folks, the problem sometimes, and where the revival starts is within the body of believers, within God's people.

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And so this is what that is all about.

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

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So he gets even more specific, and then he gets really specific in the type of people that he is going to cut down.

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

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From this place, he directly addresses the false God Baal and those that worship him.

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

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We know that.

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And apparently both the leadership and the people were entrenched in Baal worship.

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

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

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Now, if you do some study on who or what Baal was, Baal was the fertility God of this area.

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And the people that worshiped Baal would do horrendous acts.

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They would self mutilate.

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If you know the story of Elijah at Mount Carmel, remember when they were trying to compel Baal to send the fire before God?

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They were cutting themselves, right?

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There's this self mutilation.

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

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They were sacrificing their children to Baal and Moloch.

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Baal was something that they could access.

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Baal was something that they could carve out on a piece of wood and put up in their house.

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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.

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And Baal reminded them of themselves.

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Right?

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Baal was this individual, this God that they thought identified with them.

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And so Baal was the prevailing worship at that time.

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

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I'm gonna cut out this evil.

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And then he says, and the name of the.

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

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Cause it's not an english word.

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It's actually a transliteration of a hebrew word.

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And so it's the chimerons.

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And so these were the priests that were acting like they were worshiping God, but they were worshiping.

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They were blending in Baal worship.

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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.

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They were claiming, and they were taking the role of a priest that was Worshiping the one true God, but yet they were not.

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They were compromising.

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And so they were pagan priests, and they were sacrificing to Baal.

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They were sacrificing to Moloch and other pagan deities.

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

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These were the individuals that were leading the people away from the true worship of God and leading them to false worship.

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

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He stops the practice of burning incense to Baalje and worship of the sun and the moon.

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He tears down altars of Baal and destroyed all this.

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

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

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

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It means like dark, darkness.

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And so you could take that from a spiritual sense that they were dark in their actions.

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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.

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

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But ultimately, we know that they were evil priests that were taking the place of godly priests, but yet they weren't.

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And so this is God speaking to hypocrisy.

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This is God speaking to individuals that are acting like they're worshiping God, but they're not.

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They're worshiping other things, and then they're leading other people astray.

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

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We see that mentioned in the New Testament.

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God hates that.

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God hates when people pose as christians, pose as godly people, pose as biblical preachers, but yet are worshipping other things along with that.

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

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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.

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And what does that look like for us today?

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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.

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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.

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Verse five.

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And them that worship the host of heaven.

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

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That sounds like they're worshiping goddess.

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It's talking about worshiping stars, bodies, heavenly bodies, stars, planets, you know, something like that.

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

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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.

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So it's basically worshipping the astrology, right?

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

Pastor Josh: 00:19:15

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?

Pastor Josh: 00:19:24

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

Pastor Josh: 00:19:26

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

Pastor Josh: 00:19:30

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

Pastor Josh: 00:19:32

If you look at Deuteronomy, chapter four, verse 19, God warned his people not to worship the heavenly bodies.

Pastor Josh: 00:19:40

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

Pastor Josh: 00:19:43

And then also in Exodus, chapter 20, verse three and four, we know that God commanded his people to worship him and him alone and not to bow down to other gods.

Pastor Josh: 00:19:54

And so this is in direct violation to God's law and the fact that they are worshiping things outside of him.

Pastor Josh: 00:19:59

And so we see God very serious about people worshiping things that are not him.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:05

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

Pastor Josh: 00:20:08

Why?

Pastor Josh: 00:20:09

Well, if you're like me, you're starting to think, well, I don't worship baal.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:15

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

Pastor Josh: 00:20:19

I'm not worshiping Moloch.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:21

I'm not worshiping the moon, the stars.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:24

I'm glad you're not.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:25

That's good.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:27

But what we do know that within our culture today that there are individuals who do worship things that are not God, right?

Pastor Josh: 00:20:35

So a hobby, a lifestyle, money, a relationship, whatever it is, fill in the blank.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:43

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

Pastor Josh: 00:20:46

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:53

But no, the Bible says very clearly that idolatry is putting anything before God.

Pastor Josh: 00:20:57

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

Pastor Josh: 00:21:02

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

Pastor Josh: 00:21:05

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:14

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

Pastor Josh: 00:21:17

He warned that.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:18

He said, idolatry is forbidden.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:21

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:30

Which the Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:33

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:42

So meaning this.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:43

Don't worship anything else outside of God.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:46

Why?

Pastor Josh: 00:21:46

Because God is the one who has saved you.

Pastor Josh: 00:21:48

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

Pastor Josh: 00:21:50

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

Pastor Josh: 00:21:54

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:04

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:08

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:11

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:15

And we talked about that on Sunday morning.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:17

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:20

And so he says, don't do that.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:22

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:28

And that's another way to say Moloch.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:30

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:33

And they.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:34

Again, by the way, false gods are fake.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:37

Right?

Pastor Josh: 00:22:38

But we do know that there were demons who were parading around like gods that were influencing these people.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:45

And so there was something there, right?

Pastor Josh: 00:22:47

There was a force, an evil force that was about that they were worshipping, just as there's evil forces today.

Pastor Josh: 00:22:53

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

Pastor Josh: 00:22:59

But the evil forces behind that idolatry are real.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:03

The Bible says that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but about the spirituality, the darkness.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:09

And it's a spiritual battle.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:11

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:17

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

Pastor Josh: 00:23:20

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

Pastor Josh: 00:23:24

And if our minds are not filled with the word of God, the truth of God, he will fill our minds with something else.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:29

And two Corinthians, chapter ten is all about that.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:32

Casting down our imaginations, not entertaining the thoughts of the enemy, because he's putting lies in.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:37

He's trying to corrupt our minds.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:39

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:48

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

Pastor Josh: 00:23:53

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

Pastor Josh: 00:23:56

Satan is firing these fiery darts.

Pastor Josh: 00:23:58

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:06

And ultimately, we know that that is devastating for the life of an individual.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:11

And he says, you that swear by the Lord and that swear by Moloch, meaning they're double tongued.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:18

They're double minded.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:19

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

Pastor Josh: 00:24:23

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

Pastor Josh: 00:24:26

What's a double minded man?

Pastor Josh: 00:24:27

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:37

That's a double minded man.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:39

And so God is against that.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:40

God hates that.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:41

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:52

That was the main thing for Moloch.

Pastor Josh: 00:24:54

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:03

And it really put into perspective how that was something.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:07

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

Pastor Josh: 00:25:10

And so you would just see that dichotomy.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:12

You would see that contrast between the evil and the good and how it was so mingled together.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:19

It was so mingled together.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:20

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

Pastor Josh: 00:25:22

We see individuals who say, you know what?

Pastor Josh: 00:25:24

I want to have all the blessings of God.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:26

I want to praise God.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:27

Like, we're going to sing christian songs, and we're going to have our scripture verse of the day.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:32

But then also, on the other side of things, what am I filling my time in with?

Pastor Josh: 00:25:35

What am I entertaining myself with?

Pastor Josh: 00:25:37

What am I truly in my heart dwelling upon?

Pastor Josh: 00:25:40

The Bible speaks very clearly about the importance of meditating upon scripture.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:45

What is meditation?

Pastor Josh: 00:25:47

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

Pastor Josh: 00:25:49

That's actually not the biblical definition of meditation.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:52

The biblical definition of meditation is filling our minds with something.

Pastor Josh: 00:25:56

And so meditating upon scripture is filling our minds on scripture and dwelling upon it, chewing on it.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:03

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:08

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:11

And I gross everyone out when I say this.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:13

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:15

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:22

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:26

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:29

What do we do?

Pastor Josh: 00:26:29

We dwell on the things of negative values, and we dwell in things that are not pure.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:34

Philippians, chapter four, verse eight, says, for us to dwell on those things which are pure, to meditate upon those things which are true.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:40

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:51

And all I can think about is those negative things and those lies that God does not want us to be dwelling on.

Pastor Josh: 00:26:56

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

Pastor Josh: 00:26:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:27:02

We're not going to be giving him praise.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:04

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

Pastor Josh: 00:27:07

And so we see there at the end of verse five, he says, don't be a double minded person.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:12

That's the one that gets judgment.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:14

And it says, and them that are turned back from the Lord, those are the ones that have turned their backs.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:20

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

Pastor Josh: 00:27:23

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

Pastor Josh: 00:27:30

He's talking about those people that have just turned their backs against God.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:32

They've backslidden.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:33

They've gotten away from that zeal.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:35

They've gotten away from their purpose.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:37

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:49

They've forgotten.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:50

They've turned their backs.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:51

They have not sought after the Lord.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:53

They don't inquire for him.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:55

This speaks of the complacency of the church today.

Pastor Josh: 00:27:59

I believe that God hates complacency.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:02

He hates apathy.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:04

Right?

Pastor Josh: 00:28:04

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

Pastor Josh: 00:28:07

I know this because I've been there.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:09

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

Pastor Josh: 00:28:14

But we are not inquiring of God.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:15

The only God or the only word of his truth comes into our life on Sunday mornings or Sunday nights or Wednesday nights.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:23

And we can get so busy with the christian life that we lose God in all of it.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:29

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

Pastor Josh: 00:28:33

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:45

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

Pastor Josh: 00:28:47

But sometimes what we do is we justify even things that are not necessarily bad, they might be good.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:53

We justify something in our life.

Pastor Josh: 00:28:55

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

Pastor Josh: 00:28:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:01

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:05

Or maybe I need to go make another visit or.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:09

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:12

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:14

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:19

He wants us to be fully given over to him, and everything else will fall in line.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:24

And so here he's talking in verse six about those people who have lost their zeal for that personal relationship with him.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:31

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:36

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

Pastor Josh: 00:29:39

I was so excited to get to my private time with him, my secret place, to get into my devotions, to pray.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:46

And you know what?

Pastor Josh: 00:29:47

Now maybe there's not that much excitement anymore.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:49

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:59

No.

Pastor Josh: 00:29:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:30:02

We're to live a lifestyle of worship.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:04

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:13

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

Pastor Josh: 00:30:16

We're missing the point.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:17

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

Pastor Josh: 00:30:20

Right?

Pastor Josh: 00:30:21

I love corporate worship.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:22

I love coming to church.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:24

And it's not just because I work here.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:25

Okay?

Pastor Josh: 00:30:26

I love coming to church.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:28

But our life should be characterized by worship.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:32

It's not just on Sunday morning.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:33

It's not just on Sunday nights.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:34

It's not just Wednesday nights.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:35

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:43

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:30:51

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:05

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

Pastor Josh: 00:31:11

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

Pastor Josh: 00:31:15

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?

Pastor Josh: 00:31:22

I'm okay.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:24

I'm doing okay.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:25

But what does James chapter one, verse 22 say?

Pastor Josh: 00:31:27

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:37

But in James chapter one, verse 22, if it's not convicting for you, I don't know.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:50

This is one of the most convicting passages for me.

Pastor Josh: 00:31:52

James 122, it says, but be doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving your own selves.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:00

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

Pastor Josh: 00:32:04

I mean, even back at the time of Zephaniah and Josiah, there were still worship, right?

Pastor Josh: 00:32:12

There were still things going on.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:14

And so it's one thing to be hearers of the word, but the Bible says that's not enough.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:18

It says, but be doers of the word.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:21

Why?

Pastor Josh: 00:32:22

Because if you hear the word and agree with it but don't apply it, you're deceiving yourself, is what it says here.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:28

It's deceiving your own selves.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:30

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

Pastor Josh: 00:32:32

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:40

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

Pastor Josh: 00:32:43

It shows us where we are in our lives.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:45

And someone who sees what they are or who they are and sees the things that they need to change and just walks away.

Pastor Josh: 00:32:52

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:01

Verse 25.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:02

But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, meaning this is the one who looks into the word and continueth therein.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:08

Meaning, he obeys it, she obeys it.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:10

He being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:15

So the blessing is in the obedience, not just in the hearing of the word.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:19

It's in the heeding of the word.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:21

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

Pastor Josh: 00:33:25

That's where the blessing comes.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:26

You know?

Pastor Josh: 00:33:26

I know sometimes it's like, well, it's such a blessing to hear the word of God.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:29

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

Pastor Josh: 00:33:32

And I agreed.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:32

And I walked out of the service.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:34

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

Pastor Josh: 00:33:36

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

Pastor Josh: 00:33:38

He said some story about something.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:40

I don't know.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:40

And I left unaffected.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:43

I left unchanged.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:45

I agreed.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:46

But I didn't leave with the obedience.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:49

And so what we can see here in Zephaniah is that God hates the one who is having a form of godliness.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:57

And we're seeing that in the New Testament.

Pastor Josh: 00:33:59

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:05

And so there isn't a relationship.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:08

There's just a form of godliness.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:10

So God hates that.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:11

God hates people that put on.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:13

If you are tempted to think that God doesn't hate that, read the gospels and see how Jesus deals with the Pharisees, right?

Pastor Josh: 00:34:20

Who are the most religious people in Jesus time?

Pastor Josh: 00:34:24

The Pharisees.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:25

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

Pastor Josh: 00:34:28

Because why?

Pastor Josh: 00:34:29

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

Pastor Josh: 00:34:34

And so if we're not tempted, we can sit here and go down the road of destruction, saying, we're religious.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:41

We're following the word.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:42

We're fundamental.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:43

We preach the word.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:44

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

Pastor Josh: 00:34:48

And Zephaniah says, don't be those ones who have turned their back from the Lord.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:52

Those have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of him and what we can see.

Pastor Josh: 00:34:58

And I'm sensitive to the time.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:00

So I'll have one last reference.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:02

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

Pastor Josh: 00:35:04

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:19

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:38

For it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the jew first, and also to the Greek.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:43

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

Pastor Josh: 00:35:46

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

Pastor Josh: 00:35:48

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

Pastor Josh: 00:35:53

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

Pastor Josh: 00:35:58

And so it says in verse 18.

Pastor Josh: 00:35:59

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of Mendez, who hold the truth of unrighteousness.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:07

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

Pastor Josh: 00:36:10

For God hath showed it unto them.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:12

And then here's verse number 20.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:14

And I think it's important to see this.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:15

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:24

You don't have to be a believer to see God's power in this world, his creation.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:28

And I don't know about you, but all you got to do is spend about five minutes walking outside.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:32

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

Pastor Josh: 00:36:36

And it says that the creation is clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:42

And so the unseen things, the unseen things of faith are seen in the creation of God.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:47

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:36:56

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

Pastor Josh: 00:36:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:37:06

Neither were thankful.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:07

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

Pastor Josh: 00:37:13

Empty in their imaginations.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:16

Or you could say, thoughts.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:17

This is what we were talking about, right?

Pastor Josh: 00:37:19

And their foolish heart was darkened.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:23

So their hearts become darkened, professing themselves to be wise.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:26

They became fools.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:29

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

Pastor Josh: 00:37:32

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

Pastor Josh: 00:37:35

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

Pastor Josh: 00:37:41

And so then it goes on to list all these things that essentially is the product of that.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:49

And change the glory of the uncorruptible God into the image made unto a corruptible man.

Pastor Josh: 00:37:54

Meaning we change our worship from the one who should be worshipped to the things that were the creation.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:00

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:09

This speaks to the real heart issue of idolatry.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:13

They lose the fear of God, they lose the presence of God, they lose the desire to know him and to glorify him.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:21

And so therefore they turn from worshipping him and they go to his creation.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:25

They worship the creation and not the creator.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:28

And there's a lot more in that chapter.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:30

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

Pastor Josh: 00:38:34

That's a little bit of a precursor to a future study that we're going to be doing.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:39

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:51

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

Pastor Josh: 00:38:54

God created the stars, God created the sun.

Pastor Josh: 00:38:56

But when individuals who say they worship God turn to those things, it's an indication of where their heart is.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:03

Their heart is not where it needs to be.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:05

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

Pastor Josh: 00:39:07

God says, I'm going to judge.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:09

Now.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:09

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

Pastor Josh: 00:39:14

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

Pastor Josh: 00:39:18

Right.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:18

And so in our pride comes God's judgment.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:22

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

Pastor Josh: 00:39:28

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:38

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:46

And so I would tell you this, and that's the same message that we need to preach today.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:50

There are some people, I know this is a long study here, but this is a long Runway for our whole study.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:54

In Zephaniah.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:55

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

Pastor Josh: 00:39:58

We don't want to hear about that.

Pastor Josh: 00:39:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:40:02

And I agree.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:03

We preach the whole gospel.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:06

Preach the whole gospel.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:07

If I preach that God loves you, I have to understand God doesn't love your sin.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:15

It would be like me saying, okay, I love all the children of Middletown Baptist church, like the little kids of Middletown Baptist church.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:22

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

Pastor Josh: 00:40:28

I hope you guys understand that.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:29

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

Pastor Josh: 00:40:32

Right?

Pastor Josh: 00:40:32

And so there's a distinction that God loves the world by sending his only begotten son.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:37

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:46

And so there is that general love that God extends to all and proved his love by dying on the cross for your sins.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:52

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

Pastor Josh: 00:40:56

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

Pastor Josh: 00:40:59

Right.

Pastor Josh: 00:40:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:01

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:04

And so I know that maybe some of you might have misinterpreted me and says God doesn't love everybody.

Pastor Josh: 00:41:09

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:12

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:41:24

And so that's his love.

Pastor Josh: 00:41:25

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:28

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:34

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:37

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?

Pastor Josh: 00:41:42

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:46

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:47

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

Pastor Josh: 00:41:51

Now, I don't preach that alone.

Pastor Josh: 00:41:53

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:41:56

No, you tell them that there is going to be judgment and we don't know when that is ultimately going to happen.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:03

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

Pastor Josh: 00:42:07

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:12

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

Pastor Josh: 00:42:15

He's preaching judgment, but also repentance and encouragement in that.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:19

And so I would encourage you to think about that when we come to this understanding of the Gospel.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:23

Now, there are people on both sides of this.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:25

There's people that will only preach one aspect.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:27

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

Pastor Josh: 00:42:30

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:41

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

Pastor Josh: 00:42:45

All right, well, I appreciate your time.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:46

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:42:54

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

Pastor Josh: 00:42:59

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

Pastor Josh: 00:43:01

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

Pastor Josh: 00:43:06

And I've read through the Bible many times.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:08

I'm not going to lie to you.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:09

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.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:18

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

Pastor Josh: 00:43:20

So encourage you to follow along with us.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:24

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist church podcast.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:27

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

Pastor Josh: 00:43:30

If you would like to find out more information about our church or this sermon, you can find us@middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:40

You can also email me directly at joshmasaro@middletownbaptistchurch.com.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:45

if you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and follow along for future podcasts and updates.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:52

Thank you so much.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:53

God bless.

Pastor Josh: 00:43:54

Have a wonderful day.