Utumishi Blog

Great question. At the training last week the apprentices and some of the iServe staff were preaching through this sometimes-neglected prophetic book and the question came up, what is it all about, what is the message, the big idea, the big picture, the theme tune? Sometimes it’s called the melodic line.

“It’s one of the most important disciplines of the preacher. It’s alarming if you go to a church where a team of preachers is doing a series on Hebrews, for example, and each preacher has a different idea what the Book is about. It’s absolutely essential to know the way the melodic line, the argument, the theme of the Book, is going.” (Dick Lucas)

 How do you find it? The Simeon Trust is very practical and helpful:

1. Read and reread – listen long enough to hear the melody
2. Identify a top and tail (e.g. Romans 1:5 and 15:26)
3. Find a purpose statement (e.g. Luke 1:1-4, John 20:30-31) or thesis statement
4. Find repeated words and phrases and ideas (e.g. “joy” and “fellowship” in Philippians)
5. Follow the Old Testament quotations

So what about Zephaniah?

1. We certainly had to read, read and read last week and as we spent time in the text we did start to feel a bit more at home in it, start to hear the big themes…
2. From the beginning to the end it’s what the Lord says (1:1; 3:20), there’s a universal scope (1:2; 3:20), and the good news that though judgment is coming on the whole earth (1:2) there will be a gathered people receiving God’s blessing (3:20).
3. There are a series of commands: “Be silent”, “Gather”, “Seek the Lord”, “Wait for me”, “Sing aloud, shout, rejoice, exult with all your heart” – which are more passive than active, more about what God is doing than what man is doing. Perhaps the key verse is 2:3: “Seek the Lord… seek righteousness (cf. Phil. 3:8-9)… perhaps you may be hidden (Zephaniah’s name means “Hidden by the Lord”) on the day of the anger of the LORD.”
4. Repeated words/themes include “the Day”, “I will” (God’s unilateral action) and “Gathering”.
5. There is strong allusion at the beginning to the Flood of Noah’s day (1:2-3), except this time, as a friend pointed out, even the fish are not spared!

So drawing it all together: The LORD is going to bring a worldwide catastrophic judgment. It is deserved by us all and it will fall on us all (Jew and Gentile, religious, pagan, rich and poor, actively hostile or passively complacent). Repentance and revival will not save you from this judgment (cf. Zeph. 3:8; 2 Kings 23:24-27). The only hope is to be hidden – as chicks hidden under the mother chicken as the forest fire sweeps through, hidden as Noah in the ark as the waters rise, hidden in the LORD himself hanging on a cross taking the wrath and anguish and darkness and gloom.  And all this that ‘they may be with me’ (John 17:24; Zeph. 3:15-17), that the scattered idolaters may be gathered and transformed by sovereign grace (Zeph. 3:9, 20), the delight of their saviour (Zeph. 3:17) for all eternity!

Is that not the most stunning – and surprising – message you’ve ever heard?