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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

“I will stretch out my hand against Judah and against all who live in Jerusalem. I will destroy every remnant of Baal worship in this place, the very names of the idolatrous priests—those who bow down on the roofs to worship the starry host, those who bow down and swear by the Lord and who also swear by Molek, those who turn back from following the Lord and neither seek the Lord nor inquire of Him.”

“Be silent before the Sovereign Lord, for the day of the Lord is near.”

Zephaniah 1:4-7a

This ends today’s reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

After a day break to celebrate my birthday with a special devotion, today I am returning to the Book of Zephaniah where we found the prophet offering words from the Lord which promised a coming judgment on the entire world in its opening verses.

As we continue to look at chapter 1 and beyond, we find the Lord fixing His sights on a more proximate time, a time when He would exact localized judgment, not only on His people in Judah but surrounding nations as well. Look at our scripture passage for today again here:

“I will stretch out my hand against Judah and against all who live in Jerusalem. I will destroy every remnant of Baal worship in this place, the very names of the idolatrous priests—those who bow down on the roofs to worship the starry host, those who bow down and swear by the Lord and who also swear by Molek, those who turn back from following the Lord and neither seek the Lord nor inquire of Him.”

“Be silent before the Sovereign Lord, for the day of the Lord is near.”  Zephaniah 1:4-7

As we have seen throughout our study of the major and minor prophets of Israel, we know the Israelites had reached a place of spiritual adultery and apostasy that they had turned their back on God altogether, instead giving their full devotions to other gods. As we look at the Lord’s words spoken through Zephaniah, we can see this particular condemnation also present.

Many nations surrounding Israel, as well as people groups left within Canaan who were not driven out by the Israelites as God commanded, worshiped the false god Baal, a god believed to bring fertility, particularly when it came to sexual fertility or fertility for crops to flourish and yield a large harvest. We need to remember that before the Israelites were ushered into the land God had promised them, they were nomads, always moving and never settled. Thus once they finally had a place to call home, they were able to plant crops of their own and therefore fell prone to the temptation of calling on Baal to help produce a bountiful return from the fields they worked.

Note here that they didn’t turn to the God who created all things, the very God who had made the very crops the Israelites would grow with His own hands. It only shows how very detached the people of God were at this time, so much so that they lost touch with the God who had commanded them to have no other gods outside of Himself. It would be a mistake the Israelites would pay a dear price for.

Baal wasn’t the only god the Israelites had worshiped. For we find God mentioning the god Molek in our passage, a god who required child sacrifice as a part of the worship ritual. The god, also referred to as Molech, was Canaanite in origin and represented by a bronze statue that would be placed in such a way that a fire could be built around it. As the fire raged around the god, children would be tossed into the fire and burned in tribute. This is how far the Israelites had fallen, so far that they were murdering their own children in tribute to a lifeless statue formed from bronze. You can only imagine how much this incensed God who loved His children so very much. He wouldn’t stand by and allow these practices to prolong.

This is why God promised to “stretch out” His “hand against Judah and against all who live in Jerusalem", destroying “every remnant of Baal worship” as well as the “very names of the idolatrous priests”. We see God calling out those wicked spiritual leaders for bowing “on the roofs to worship the starry host” and swearing loyalty to Molek. In sum, these men who were supposed to be the most devout followers and servants of the Lord were the ones who had turned away from Him, neither seeking nor inquiring of Him. Again, the Lord wasn’t going to put up with this.

And so the Lord promised action, ordering His people to “be silent” before Him because “the day of the Lord” was near, a day when His judgment would come and come in a big way, in a way that would find the Israelites cut off from their God. If they wanted to live apart from Him, then they would see how life would look like in doing so, a life void of any of His blessing and provision, a life emptied of His presence, direction, and guidance.

Indeed, we know the nation of Israel and its two kingdoms were attacked and destroyed by the Assyrians and Babylonians, the once proud country left in ruins and desolate as its people were carried off into captivity for seventy years. It was quite a penalty but one that should remind us that God will not stand by and do nothing when His people sin against Him and others.

It should give us caution as we look at the world around us today for we should always be assessing things in relation to how God sees it. Would He bless our communities, our states, or our nations today or would He see so much wickedness that His anger would be stoked to the place of cutting Himself off from His people?

Will there be a repeat of the lengthy punishment God sent upon His people?

There won’t be if we choose to place the Lord first in everything and allow Him to guide all that we do, giving Him our fullest measure of respect, obedience, and devotion. Let’s all recommit ourselves to doing just that today and in all our days to follow.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark
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