Zephaniah 3
The Swamp
By Dr. J. Michael Strawn
THE PRECONDITIONS FOR THE SWAMP.
PART 1: THE CULTURE OF CORRUPTION.
#1. “Woe to her who is rebellious and defiled, the tyrannical city! She heeded no voice, she accepted no instruction. She did not trust in the Lord, she did not draw near to her God”, V.1. #2. The swamp is nothing more nor less than an organized CULTURE OF CORRUPTION. #3. The prophet calls His enemies “rebellious”. This is a people dedicated to rebellion against the God of the Bible, the God of creation. #4. They had rebelled against the DETERMINANT REALITY & FINAL AUTHORITY OVER MANKIND. #5. There was absolutely no FEAR OF GOD! #6. Another PRECONDITION FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SWAMP IS DEFILEMENT. HOLINESS is fixed by God alone. But the civilization spoken of here respected no ABSOLUTE STATE OF HOLINESS. They sought to CONSCIOUSLY defile anything & everything that had been previously designated as HOLY BY THE ALMIGHTY. The result was a contrived cheapening of human existence! #7. The swamp was animated by, driven by THE IMPULSE OF TYRANNY! No one was allowed to violate the engineered dicta of the CULTURE OF CORRUPTION. Any resistance was then, obviously put down by whatever means. #8. No “INSTRUCTION” was sought after, none was respected, none was permitted. All of a sudden, those who believed in REVEALED ABSOLUTES were classified as enemies of the SWAMP, the STRUCTURE OF CORRUPTION. Any SOURCE of SUPERIOR INSTRUCTION of SUPERIOR TRUTHS, of SUPERIOR IDEAS was deleted, forsaken & abrogated. #9. TRUST IN TRANSCENDENT REALITY was eventually nominated as MYTHIC! And the people who had no alternative but to DEFEND THE INTEGRITY OF THE TRANSCENDENT DEITY were pronounced to be idiots & mentally impaired. Alive spiritually, believers were essentially dead in THE TERMS OF THE SWAMP. #10. SPIRITUALITY, by biblical terms, was loyal to an unquestioned beginning point: DRAW NEAR TO GOD. In the world, but not of the world, such believers could not, would not be absorbed by the SWAMP. #11. These, are at least, some of the STRATEGIC PRECONDITIONS PRECEDING THE FORMULATION OF THE SWAMP. Of course, this is all IDEOLOGICAL ANTI-GODISM. Too many churches have been absorbed by the SWAMP. This is called PROGRESSIVISM. In every EPOCH OF PERVERSION through time, believers do not turn to God, but to their own PRIDE & ARROGANCE which blinds us to the Greater reality!
THE POSITIONALITY OF THE SWAMP.
PART 2: THE LEADERS OF CORRUPTION.
#1. “Her princes within her are roaring lions, her judges are wolves at evening; they leave nothing for the morning. Her prophets are reckless, treacherous men; her priests have profaned the sanctuary. They have done violence to the law”, V.3, 4. #2. All leadership is essentially SPIRITUAL. But those people did not know the SECRET OF SPIRITUAL LEADERSHIP. They were driven by carnality & not the SPIRITUAL. No SPIRITUAL VISION had been left to them! Their consciousness had been truncated by the temporal! Transcendent reality was of no consequence to them. Perhaps they observed the formal, the ceremonial & the ritual, but it was MEANINGLESS FROM THE LORD’S POINT OF VIEW. And that was the only view that mattered! #3.The “Princes” roared loudly & affected perhaps great ambition & enthusiasm Yet were not at all committed to their duty! #4. Their “judges” were ravenous, like wolves, mostly concerned with the issues of PERSONAL CONSUMPTION. They were IMMODERATE! “…(left) nothing for the morning.” #5. “Prophets” charged with seeking the will, word & wisdom of the Almighty, had become “reckless” a SUPERB THOUGHTLESSNESS had apparently overtaken them. Their words must have been calculated to appear to be profound but were, in fact, vacuous! In their hands PROPHECY had been reduced to mere SUBJECTIVE OPINION, without authority & devoid of TRUE CONTENT! #6. And the “priests” had profaned the sanctuary. The task of protecting the INTEGRITY OF THE HOLY, had been forsaken! They demeaned even the space that the Lord had taken for Himself! Things were imported into the sanctuary that had no place there. Those men were fully absent of any PERSONAL CHARACTER. Hollow of soul & spirit, they were, what is today called placeholders! They were lightweights, without substance! #7. Knowingly or unknowingly these INEPT SERVANTS, had “done violence to the law”. The “law” had not been served nor its ends achieved! #8. WORTHLESS! CORRUPTION had become their ruling ethic. These sorry people served only their own ends; their sacred duty & responsibility abandoned! The lost sheep of Jerusalem were left bereft of understanding & their souls unattended! #9. No examples of STRONG SPIRITUAL MEN, who knew what to do, were there. No one led the way to repentance of & remorse for sin! The lights went out in Jerusalem! #10. No one took responsibility for the then SPIRITUAL CONDITION of the city. That was not the agenda. No. The agenda was the self & acquisition of what we now call “VALUES” & NOT ABSOLUTES. #11. Such people described in this text were purely FUNCTIONARIES OF THE SWAMP & nothing more!
THE SWAMP IN RELATION TO THE SUPREME SPIRITUAL CONTEXT.
PART 3: THE TRUE CONTEXT.
#1. “The Lord is righteous within her; He will do no injustice. Every morning He brings His justice to light; He does not fail. But the unjust knows no shame. I have cut off nations; their corner towers are in ruins. I have made their streets desolate, with no one passing by; their cities are laid waste, without a man, without an inhabitant”, V.5, 6. #2. The SWAMP, regardless of their acknowledgement of it, is SURMOUNTED by a SUPERNATURAL CONTEXT which is determinant over the world. #3. This REVEALED TRUTH, is very consequential for those in the CULTURE OF CORRUPTION. The reason is this, the Lord is not CORRUPT. #4. “…He will do no injustice…”. His motives are different, higher & spiritual. And His justice is inevitable & inescapable! #5. Unfortunately for the denizens of the Swamp the Lord will be the last one standing when judgment comes! #6. At the then present those of the UNIVERSE OF PERVERSION, operate without “shame”, that will be finally pushed into the open! The Almighty is identified with “justice”. Not COMPARATIVE JUSTICE, but ABSOLUTE JUSTICE. Of this the SWAMP knows nothing! And that to their ultimate undoing! #7. There is something to be remembered here: GOD “does not fail! Ever. #7. There is no TEMPORAL STRUCTURE OR ORGANIZATION THAT CAN FINALLY RESIST THE GOD OF JUSTICE. #8. Historically, the Lord had always throttled evil men! #8. “I have cut off nations;”. That is His way in time & materiality. It will always be His way! #9. If one goes down the road toward COLLECTIVE OF EVIL, then, ETERNAL RETRIBUTION will be the only possible outcome! #10. Nations with mighty fortifications (“corner towers”), were overrun & devastated by an unseen yet quite conscious & determined enemy, A SPIRITUAL ENEMY. The most powerful of all! #11. But that means nothing to the SWAMP. Nothing that the SWAMP HAD BUILT WOULD ENDURE, LET ALONE SURVIVE. “I have made their streets desolate”!
THE SWAMP.
PART 4: DIVINE EXPECTATIONS.
#1. “I said, ‘Surely you will revere Me, Accept instruction.’ So her dwelling will not be cut off according to all that I have appointed concerning her. But they were eager to corrupt all their deeds”, V.7. #2. The Almighty has EXPECTATIONS regarding human behavior. He extends patience toward all of us. Still, His will must be obeyed. There is a prior quality of character expected in the people of God. We are to “revere” the Lord. A deep respect & honor of the Lord. The MOST HIGH IS TO BE ELEVATED TO A UNIQUE & SOLITARY POSITION IN THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF EVERY BELIEVER. #3. Yet the fact was that the people of Jerusalem had refused to revere the Almighty! #4. Those people, that sociology, did not think the Lord worthy of such honor. He had been depreciated in their comprehension. #5. If a people despise the Lord, then that affects their thought, speech & behavior. In consequence, Jerusalem was a SWAMP; devoted to corruption. #6. But a price is exacted because of that behavior. Such a people will be “cut off” from God. WE HAVE HERE TWO WORLDS IN A STATE OF COLLISION. This irreverent claque of people rejected all SUPERNATURAL “instruction”. Therefore, they were doomed! #7. These people were eager to pursue PERSONAL CORRUPTION. The ALMIGHTY held no place of honor in their hearts! His “instruction” was rejected, disparaged. All of their deeds were rotten, perverted, corrupt, pagan & consciously discontinuous from the character of God. They generated their own living hell on earth! Nothing was sacred, meaning was generated by ideological methods. #8. Human life had lost its spiritual moorings; they were all adrift in meaningless evil. The culture had failed because enough individuals had sacrificed their inner being. #9. Only SUPERNATURAL REVEALED TRUTH COULD HAVE SAVED THEM. #10. The true condition of the SWAMP was this: IT WAS DRIVEN BY TRAGIC IGNORANCE OF THE GREATER REALITY.
THE SWAMP.
PART 5: THE SWAMP IS OVER ITS HEAD.
#1. “Therefore wait for Me, declares the Lord, “For the day when I rise up as a witness. Indeed, My decision is to gather nations, to assemble kingdoms, to pour out on them My indignation, all My burning anger; for all the earth will be devoured by the fire of My zeal.” V.8. #2. This is an extraordinary collection of SUPERNATURAL PROPOSITIONS. These statements point to BIBLICAL REALISM. #3. The populated world must accept an EPIC CIRCUMSTANCE. The entire world is held by or suspended in the will, word & the power of God! Therefore, it is perfectly advisable to “…wait for…”, the Lord. The inference is that human beings are at the disposition of a HIGHER ORDER OF REALITY. That is all of us, all of the time! #4. Furthermore, TIME IS NOT HOMOGENEOUS; it is rather broken up into discrete parts, with discrete purposes. For example, there will come a day, a discrete moment in time when God will “…rise up as a witness…” and He means against them. #5. Time, history & materiality are always CONTRACTING BACK UPON THE WILL, WORD, and POWER OF GOD. This revealed fact about time is meant as a warning to mankind. Play today & pay tomorrow! #6. Men are not independent of the authority of the Almighty. We never will be. Denizens of the SWAMP BEWARE! They are under observation by the SUPREME AUTHORITY. #7. The Lord has His own ways of dealing with the disobedient. “Indeed, My decision is to gather the nations, …assemble kingdoms, pour out…indignation & …anger”. #8. He refers to societal & perhaps civilizational destruction. We learn that SUPERNATURAL WRATH will be directed inevitably against the full internal structure of the SWAMP. There is a source of energy external to history, time & circumstance, perfectly dangerous to the irritating & objectionable elements of the SWAMP. #9. Think of it! This is global reach “gathering & assembling the nations” scheduled for discipline or worse! #10. Zephaniah alerts us to the dimensions of SUPERNATURAL ANGER. He devours nations as He chooses! Those who prefer the SWAMP are subject to the final resolution of their case & it will not be pretty. Irresistible SPIRITUAL ANGER has them in its sights! Nothing can withstand that range, depth & scope of ANGER. This is BIBLICAL REALISM.
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