Here’s the audio and note for my sermon “The Wrath of God” (Zephaniah 1-2:3) preached at Cross of Christ Fellowship in Naperville.
ZEPHANIAH 1-2:3 “The Wrath of God”
Intro: Today we are going to consider the weighty topic of the wrath of God—God’s holy, righteous anger toward sin and evil.
-This is not a light-hearted, easy, practical sermon, but a serious consideration of God’s character & nature from Zephaniah 1-2:3
-This is not the Disney god or god of pop culture, BUT the one true and living God who has wrath & will judge the Earth
-God’s wrath is real, not a myth, and we are fools if we just ignore it.
*Our greatest danger in suburbia is not our kids failing to succeed, losing our jobs, health, or comfort, but having to face the holy wrath of God!*
*M.I.: God’s wrath is coming and simply being religious will not save you.
BOOK OF ZEPHANIAH: God’s wrath and judgment are coming, but also His salvation to those who seek Him
-Chapters 1-3:9=God’s judgment; 3:9-end=God’s salvation, mercy and love for His people
*TODAY: WARNING! One preacher=fire alarm. Behold your desperate situation and act now!
*God’s wrath is coming and simply being religious will not save you*
I. SETTING: (1:1): God’s Word to Judah—a religious people who were wicked and not seeking God
-Zephaniah preached in the Southern Kingdom before the exile under a time of great wickedness and some reformation
-King Josiah was the grandson of King Manasseh—55 year reign, extraordinary sin and evil (2 Kings 21:1-9)
-Josiah’s Father Amon was no better—2 year reign, then assassinated (2 Kings 21:20-21).
-King Josaiah became king at age 8, reigned for 31 years, and brought about some reformation in the land (Zeph helped?)
-During a temple renovation the Bible was rediscovered and read
-Great shock at how much Israel had fallen and prophecy confirmed: God was angry at His people.
*NOTICE with ME: Zephaniah’s prophecy is GOD’S WORD “the word of the LORD”
-We can’t disregard it, just because we don’t like it: we must hear it and seek to understand it.
-A Word to God’s people then and NOW à God’s wrath is coming and simply being religious will not save you
II. GOD’S WRATH IS COMING: (1:2-2:2)
2 Things to Observe: 1. The nature of God’s wrath; 2. The cause for His impending wrath—the sin of the people.
-UNIVERSAL JUDGMENT of God (2-3)
-God will bring a judgment that “SWEEPS AWAY” everything
–NOTE: the comprehensive/universal nature
-God’s wrath is a response to our WICKEDNESS (3b)
-PERSONAL NATURE OF GOD’S WRATH (4-6)
*NOTE: “I will stretch…I will cut off..”
-God’s judgment is personal in nature, as God Himself executes judgment
-This message is directed to Judah and Jerusalem—a religious people!
-Mere religious affiliation is not enough to spare you from God’s judgment
-Having Christian parents, coming to church on Sundays, merely saying you are a Christian
-Jesus had the hardest worst for those who were most religious: the Pharisees
-God’s judgment is coming upon the IDOLATRY of Israel (4b-5)
-Baal, idolatrous priests, those who bow to host of heaven
–IDOLS OF SUBURBIA: Children’s Programs; Money; Homes; Success; Comfort; Entertainment
–EVIL OF SYNCRETISM: “swear to the LORD and yet swear by MILCOM”
–TODAY: Ecumenicalism: prayer with other religions; Christianity and New Spirituality
-God’s judgment is on those who have turned from God, and do not seek or inquire of him (6)
-Sin is a refusal to follow God and a refusal to SEEK Him and it is a GREAT EVIL: (Jere 2:11-13, 19)
-GOD’S WRATH AGAINST ROYALS AND COMMONERS (7-10)
-“Day of the LORD”
-Day when God’s wrath and judgment for sin arrive
–Multiple fulfillments of Day of Lord: Jerusalem’s destruction in 586 B.C. (40 years later)
-Day of Wrath at the end of history (Rom 2:5)
-Wrath against Royals (7-8)
-NOTE: worldly compromise “all who array themselves in foreign attire”
-Being a son of a king or royalty or worldly famous will not spare you from God’s wrath
-*Celebrities and Presidents need to be delivered from wrath
-Wrath against COMMONERS (9-11): -“Servants…merchants”
–NOTE: “leaps over the threshold”= Philistine superstition
“fills mater’s house with violence and fraud”
-God’s wrath is against our personal acts of sin
-HEAR THE SOUNDS OF DESTRUCTION (10): “cry…wail…loud crash”
-YOU CANNOT HIDE FROM GOD’S WRATH (12)
-CANNOT HIDEà “search with lamps” (see also Rev 6:15-17)
-WRATH IS AGAINST THE “COMPLACENT” (12)
-Sentiment is still holds today: “LORD will not do good, nor will be do ill”
QUESTION: Is this your attitude? Are you complacent about God?
-GOD’S JUDGMENT WILL DESTROY WORLDLY POSSESSIONS (13)
-Futile nature of “storing up treasures” on Earth (Matt 6:19-21)
-CONSIDER THE MANY DESCRIPTIONS OF THE TERRIFYING DAY OF THE LORD (1:14-2:2)
-Coming soon (14a)
-Bitter and even the mightiest of human men will wail before God (14b)
-Day of wrath (15a)
-Day of distress and anguish (15b)
-Day of ruin and devastation (15c)
-Day of darkness and gloom (15d)
-Day of clouds and thick darkness (15e)
-Day of “trumpet blast and battle cry” (16a)
-Devastating day of destruction (17-18)
-NO MONEY CAN SAVE YOU FROM IT (18)
–*REASON FOR WRATH: “because they have sinned against the LORD” (17)
-We must recover the Biblical view of sin: it is evil, awful, worthy of wrath and condemnation.
-Day of the anger of the LORD (2:1-2)
-NT à2 Thess 1:7-10
SUMMARY: God’s wrath and judgment are coming because of the evil and wickedness of man.
-There was a partial fulfillment of this in 587 B.C. in destruction of Jerusalem and the temple
-There will be a complete fulfillment of this at the return of CHRIST.
*OBJECTION: I thought God was a God of love. How can you speak about God of wrath?
ANSWER: God is love, but He also has a just, holy anger toward sin.
-Mirslov Volf’s discovery: (Genocide) God has wrath because he is love.
“I used to think that wrath was unworthy of God. Isn’t God love? Shouldn’t divine love be beyond wrath? God is love, and God loves every person and every creature. That’s exactly why God is wrathful against some of them. My last resistance to the idea of God’s wrath was a casualty of the war in the former Yugoslavia, the region from which I come. According to some estimates, 200,000 people were killed and over 3,000,000 were displaced. My villages and cities were destroyed, my people shelled day in and day out, some of them brutalized beyond imagination, and I could not imagine God not being angry. Or think of Rwanda in the last decade of the past century, where 800,000 people were hacked to death in one hundred days! How did God react to the carnage? By doting on the perpetrators in a grandparently fashion? By refusing to condemn the bloodbath but instead affirming the perpetrators’ basic goodness? Wasn’t God fiercely angry with them? Though I used to complain about the indecency of the idea of God’s wrath, I came to think that I would have to rebel against a God who wasn’t wrathful at the sight of the world’s evil. God isn’t wrathful in spite of being love. God is wrathful because God is love.”
-The opposite of love is not hate, but indifference.
–IMAGINE: Someone hurts your loved one. Love is not to be indifference but to express a righteous anger.
-SURPRISE of God’s Wrath: When rightly understood, leads us marvel at Him and worship Him.
-God is not indifferent to evil, but punishes evil in this life and in the life to come.
-No one will get away with sin or evil, even if they are not caught in this life.
III. OUR RESPONSE: 2:7a, 3:3.
WHAT SHOULD WE DO? HOW SHOULD WE RESPOND TO THE REALITY OF GOD’S WRATH?1. BE SILENT (2:7)
-The impending wrath of God is not something to mock or ignore, but be silent before
-Be silent before GOD this week.
2. SEEK THE LORD (3:3)
–Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands;
-Whole-hearted striving after Him and commitment to Him.
–seek righteousness;
-Whole-hearted striving to do what is right before God, rather than man.
–seek humility;
-Whole-hearted humbling of our hearts and lives before God.
HINT OF HOPE (3:3B): perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the LORD.
-Commentators NOTE: ‘hint of hope’ à “perhaps”
-Judgment was coming, but if one seeks God there might be a hiding away
-Believers still suffer physical/emotionally in God’s judgment.
CONCLUSION: God’s wrath is coming and simply being religious will not save you!
-Merely being religious will not save you from the wrath of God, but Christ can and will save you!
-GOSPEL: We deserve the holy wrath of God, but God Himself—God the Son—took the wrath for us on the cross.
-If you have believed in Christ, there is no more wrath for you: Rom 5:9
CLOSE: Are you merely religious, or you truly seeking the Lord and trusting in Christ as your Savior from God’s wrath?
–Repent of sin, believe the gospel, and seek the LORD today!
