1. Chapters 1:1-1:5
2. Chapters 1:6-3:15
3. Chapters 3:16-4:6

The book of Malachi was written almost 100 years after Haggai and Zechariah (the 1^st and 2^nd of the post-exile prophets). He writes during the seven year absence of Nehemiah who went back to Persia prior to his return to deal with the issues that God spoke of through Malachi. The book closes out the Old Testament in 55 verses 47 of which are spoken directly by God to the people (a higher percentage then any other book in the Bible). The work of rebuilding the temple that God used Haggai and Zechariah to motivate the people to do has long ago been completed and its completion caused the people to slip from compliancy to compromise and corruption. And it is to this that God speaks trough Malachi. His name means messenger but beyond that nothing is known of him as the focus is upon the message and not the messenger. This book bridges the gap of 400 years silence until the coming of John the Baptist and 50 years until Matthew would write his account.          

I. Chapters 1:1-1:5

In these first 5 verses God tries to soften the hardening hearts of the nation as they have grown complacent as they question how God loves them. Saints, this is always where we will falter and fall into compromise and corruption, right where we begin to question God’s love for us. In 1:2-3 God answers their questioning heart of “In what way have You loved us?” By saying, “I have loved you” “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? Yet Jacob I have loved; But Esau I have hated, and laid waste his mountains and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness.” These were twin brothers and Paul in Romans 9:11 tells us that this choice of God choosing Jacob was before they “born, nor having done any good or evil”. So God says, “Hey you doubt I love you look at your heritage, I choose to love you when you were a scoundrel and I’ve continued to love you look at your brother’s Esau’s land its uninhabited and here you all are back in the land”. Some folks have a problem with this passage as it says that God hated Esau but the word here means to love less. Having read the Bible and the life of Jacob I too have a problem with this verse but its in how God could ever love Jacob! Hey saint’s, have you ever heard someone say, “To know me is to love me”? I think that it is the opposite if any of you really knew what a dirt bag I really am you wouldn’t love me you’d run from me. Ah but consider this truth that no one knows you better then God as we are told in Isaiah 66:18 “I know their works and their thoughts.” Yet the One who knows us best is the very One who loves me the most. Amazing Love! God’s point to these people is to not look at the moment to determine God’s love look to the truth of His word and you will see His love. I’m afraid that far too often God’s children are so spoiled that they think that God owes them something more then He has already given them His only begotten Son. “God we cry out, don’t you care for me, how come you haven’t given me what I asked for, how come Sally gets blessed and I don’t?” And God says, “Hey child of mine I love you the same but differently, what’s good for Sally isn’t good for you. How can you doubt My love for you haven’t I already given both you and Sally my very best, My only begotten Son?”

            One thing is certain dear ones, doubt and depression will come knocking at your door but don’t open the door instead open the windows and take a look towards the heavens and see His blessings poured out towards you!   

II. Chapters 1:6-3:15

Chapters 1:7-2:9: Here God address the fact that the people have only followed the priests in their life styles as they offered imperfect animals on the altar. They cared more to give the Persian governors better then they were willing to give God. It was far this reason they were lacking in blessings. Malachi 1:6 says, “A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am the Father, where is My honor? And if I am a Master, where is My reverence?” Then they ask “In what way have we despised Your name?” to which God says in 1:7 “You offer defiled food on My altar.” They were bring God their “leftovers” of their “time, talent and treasure” and were complaining that they were lacking. You see in Exodus 23:19 God had told them they were to offer the “firstfruits” the best of their time, talent and treasure. God says in 1:8 “You offer the blind the lame and sick, if it’s so good offer it then to your governor!” But not only that we are told in 1:9-10 they then turned around to “Entreat God’s favor, that He may be gracious to us.” God says, “Who is there even among you who would shut the doors”. They were doing the bare minimum as an act of religion then complaining to God that they didn’t have enough. So God says, I’m just going to “shut the doors on you and bless others who are willing to give what I’ve already given you”. Saints let me make certain that you understand what God is saying here, He is not upset at their lack of giving it was the quality of the giving not the quality of their giving. In Mark 12:42-44 when the widow came into the temple to give only two mites Jesus didn’t condemn her He commended her for Giving the BEST of what she had. Dear ones God never asks us to give what He hasn’t first already given us. The worst part of this that the people were only following the examples of the priests. In 2:2 God says, “If you will not hear, and if you will not take it to heart, to give glory to My name, I will send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings.” There are folk’s whom God has blessed but they continue to rip God off giving Him only the “blind, lame and sick” of their “time, talent and treasure” and they will soon find that God’s blessings have become a curse. God has given us that we might give away friends!

            In 2:10 God asks them “Have don’t you all have the same Father?” “So why are you ripping each other off?” No society that puts God first by giving to Him of their time talent and treasure will be able to teat their fellow man any different then they would want to be treated. The problem on both sides of the health care issue is self centeredness! The Insurance companies have for too long ripped off their clients and now the government wants to do the same. No greater area was this seen then in the area of divorce as the people were divorcing their godly spouses to remarry people of the world. They had made a covenant with God and a commitment to their wife’s but now emotion was what caused them to pull away after the ungodly women. Job said in 31:1 “I have made a covenant with my eyes; why then should I look upon a young woman?” This had in affect upon the children now as well as there were now children who had a compromised father and an unbelieving mother. That is why God says in verse 16 that “He hates divorce” but did you notice that it doesn’t say that God hates the “divorced”? I’m afraid that for far too long we have treated those who have divorced with contempt . The words translated here “violence” in verse 16 can is also translated “bitterness” and quite often the break up of a marriage ends up in one or both of these emotions.  

            God says in 2:17 “You have wearied the Lord with your words…In that you say,

    “Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He delights in them”. Those that teach God’s word are called to a higher standard and these priests were distorting God’s word by say that those that practiced evil need not change their ways. God indeed loves us sinners but He loves us far too much to allow us to stay in our bondage and death!

Chapter 3: God says in 3:1 that He will “send My messenger, and he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His temple, even the Messenger of the covenant, in whom you delight. Behold, He is coming”. God was going to send John the Baptist 400 years later to prepare the way before Jesus who was coming suddenly to His temple with a “New Covenant” of grace. Of Him God says in 3:3 “He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver; He will purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer to the Lord an offering in righteousness.”

            All this was yet to come because God says in verses 6-7 “I do not change” and the people needed to return to Him so that He would return to them. Now in verse 8 God again brings up the area of tithing as He says in 3:8 “Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me! But you say, ‘In what way have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings.” God says in 3:10 “Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house, and try Me now in this,” Says the Lord of hosts, If I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it.” Did you know in the Bible there are over 450 verses on faith, over 500 verses on prayer but there are over 2,100 verses on giving? 1 out of every 10 verses in the N.T. deals giving, money or possessions. Folks’ apparently giving is very important to God but it’s not His way of raising income. No, it’s His way of testing hearts as Luke 12:34 says, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” You see God is a giver and He calls His children to be like Him, He wants us to give not because He wants our money but rather because He wants our hearts. The word Tithe means a 10^th and the people had been holding back on giving God a 10^th because their hearts weren’t right. The concept of giving a 10^th goes back before the law to the time of Abraham as he gave a 10^th of all he owned to Melchizedek. In the Old testament law the amount the people were to give was actually 23% (10% to the Levites, 10% to the Lord, 10% every three years, and 1/6^th of all crops). Here is the point God wants you to give only 10% of what He has already given you so that He can bless the other 90%. All of this has to do with our hearts of worship before the Lord! Giving to the Lord makes great sense financially as well because God isn’t going to ever become our debtor, you will never be able to out give God, and He will never owe you one!         

III. Chapters 3:16-4:6

God says in 3:17 “They shall be Mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “On the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.” As a goldsmith I realized that the difference between a gem and a rock was time, pressure and testing and polishing! Folk’s that is what God is doing while we are here in this world changing us from a stony hearted person to a gem by pressure, testing and polishing! Malachi ends on some tough words but the next words they would hear is that of the Messiah. In 4:2 God says, “But to you who fear My name The Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing in His wings; and you shall go out and grow fat like stall-fed calves.” But before that God says in 4:5-6 “I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.”

1. Chapters 1-6 A night of visions
2. Chapters 7-8 God’s answer to questions
3. Chapters 9-14 A future and a hope

Zechariah, the 2^nd chronologically of the post-exile prophets after Haggai before Malachi is mentioned in Ezra along with Haggai who prophesied during the same time frame. Unlike Haggai who was born in Jerusalem and exiled in Babylon, Zechariah was born in Babylon and returned to Jerusalem a part of the 45,000 exiles that returned after the 70 year captive led by Zerubbabel the political leader and Joshua the High Priest.             Though both Haggai and Zechariah write at around the same time both addressing the abandonment of the rebuilding of the temple for 16 years they do so from a very different approach:

Haggai says: “What do you mean it’s not time to do the Lord’s work”?

Zachariah says: “If you get busy God will bless you with His presence!” 

II. Chapters 7-8 God’s answer to questions

Chapter 7: Two years after the 8 visions the people come to Zechariah with a question about fasting. For the 70 years that the people had been in captivity they had regularly fasted four specific days to seek the Lord and to repent of the sin that had caused them to be in Babylon and apparently for the last 18 years they had continued to keep up the practice. So now with the temple being built and the people being blessed they wanted to know if they needed to keep doing so. So in 7:5 the Lord says through Zechariah, “When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months during those seventy years, did you really fast for Me–for Me?” Oh dear ones God goes to the heart of the matter and that is a lot of the time what motivates our actions is religious duty and not true brokenness. Is what we do a sign to others or to manipulate God into thinking that we mean it this time? So God says, “Forget the rituals and show me you mean it by how you treat your fellow man!” Saints, you only love God to the degree that you demonstrate your love to those who deserve it the least! (7:8-10). In 1 John 4:20 John writes “If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” In Zech. 7:11-14 God says, “It wasn’t because you weren’t observing religious fasting that you ended up in captivity. No, it was because you weren’t merciful to your brothers and sisters!” James says in 1:27 “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.” Dear ones is your walk dry is there no joy to your life? Hey you don’t need more religion, No you need to practice relationship!  

Chapter 8: God promises that if they would practice their relationship with Him instead of empty religion then they will not only be blessed they will be a blessing! In Zech. 8:3

God says, “I will return to Zion, and dwell in the midst of Jerusalem. Jerusalem shall be called the City of Truth”. Such a presence of Jesus amongst will cause (8:4-5) “Old men and old women shall again sit in the streets of Jerusalem, each one with his staff in his hand because of great age. The streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in its streets.” Oh dear ones we can get a glimpse of the Kingdom of God while on earth if we would but leave the adults in the room and go outside and play with the kids in the street! In 8:6-9 God says, “Hey I know that you got caught up in your own lives these last 18 years but what your building spiritually now is going to just be a blessing for you it’s going to continue on for generations!” So “Let your hands be strong…that the temple might be built!” Saint’s do you want to leave something behind as a legacy for your children, grandchildren, for this nation? There is no greater long lasting inheritance we can pass on to the future generations then our renewed and revived faith! God reminds them in 8:10-15 that where there was once a lack of prosperity when God was the center of their worship they would again be prosperous. Saying in 8:13 “Just as you were a curse among the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, so I will save you, and you shall be a blessing. Do not fear, let your hands be strong.” Then God says in 18-19, “You came with a question about fasts, well if you make me the center of worship you will be making every month a feast not a fast!” Then in 8:23 God says that, “In those days ten men from every language of the nations shall grasp the sleeve of a Jewish man, saying, “Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.” Saints, when you and I start living what we say we believe turning our fasts into feasts folks will be grabbing our sleeves saying “Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.” There is no greater threat to the world we live in then Christians who have turned away from religious rituals and towards practicing our relationship with God by feasting on His presence!

III. Chapters 9-14 A future and a hope

Here we come into the final section of Zechariah as he is given two burdens (9:1 and 12:1).

• The first is in chapters 9-11 where he sees the first coming of Jesus and the nations rejection.
• The 2^nd burden is in chapters 12-14 where he sees the 2^nd coming of Jesus where He comes to set up His righteous reign upon the earth!

In both of these “burdens of the Word of the Lord” Zechariah is no longer a young prophet as almost 40 years has past and the temple has been rebuilt. What he writes is not about the temple it about Who inhabits the temple! Dear ones you can always gage your growth in Christ by looking at what captivates your interest concerning spiritual things.

1. You see when we are young in the Lord what interests us is “building” all the activity and things to do as often we look at our spiritual health in terms of what we are doing for God.
2. The as we grow more spiritually we become more interested in doctrinal matters, “What about fasts and feasts?”, We want too know!
3. Ah but when we grow further our attention seems to be only on the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We just want to spend more time in getting to know God better , and specifically when do we get to see Him face to face?

Chapter 9: As Zechariah looks out into the future the first thing he sees is what for us has already happened but yet to happen for them and that is the Coming of Alexander the Great. He sees in 9:2-6 the route that Alexander the Great would take 150 years later as he and his army came down from Greece. He sees in 9:7-8 that when  Alexander the Great came to Jerusalem instead of destroying the city he would actually protect it. History tells us that when he came the High Priest and a group of religious leaders came out to meet him and showed him Daniel 8:7-8 and how his arrival was predicted 250 years earlier and he was so amazed by this that he had the High Priest offer a lamb for his sins. Yet in the midst of this prophecy Zechariah records in 9:9 that the nation was to “Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey.” We know that historically Alexander the Great road a powerful horse named Bucephalus “bull headed” (so named because his head looked as broad as a bull’s) surrounded by soldiers. Yet here Zechariah doesn’t see a king riding a stallion, no he sees riding a lowly unbroken male donkey. He came ridding an animal that signified humility and peace; ah but in Rev. 19:11 John sees at the 2^nd coming “a white horse and He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war.”

            The rest of this vision Zechariah sees what God will do to the divided nation of Greece after Alexander the Greats death through Judas Maccabee and his gang that stopped Antiochus Epiphanes.

Chapter 10: There were two rainy seasons in Israel: October-December and April-May which caused the nation to be dependant upon the rain for irrigation. In 10:1 we read that they were to “Ask the Lord for rain in the time of the latter rain. The Lord will make flashing clouds; He will give them showers of rain, grass in the field for everyone.” After the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and dispersed the Jews the Turks came in and possessed the land taxing the people based upon the number of trees of their land. So to keep taxes low the folks cut down all their trees changing the ecological cycle of the land all but eliminating the “later rain”. Ah but into this arid strip of land came the Jews in 1948 not only repatriating the land but also reforesting the land planting millions of trees and back came the latter rains!

            In verses 2-4 Zechariah speaks about the 1^st coming and why they didn’t recognize Jesus saying in 10:4 that “From him comes the cornerstone, from him the tent peg, from him the battle bow, from him every ruler together.” Then in verses 5-6 Zechariah says that even though they though away the cornerstone pegging Him to the cross He will still come back but this time on a white horse of judgment! Though they cast in off He will in 10:8 “whistle for them and gather them, for I will redeem them; and they shall increase as they once increased.” And according to 10:11 “He shall pass through the sea with affliction, and strike the waves of the sea”.

Chapter 11: Here in this chapter Zechariah speaks of tough times when God will discipling His people for their own good. In verse 7 he describes His use of the shepherds staff in His care of them saying “I fed the flock for slaughter, in particular the poor of the flock. I took for myself two staffs: the one I called Beauty, and the other I called Bonds; and I fed the flock.” Hey saints God cares for us with two staffs one He calls “Grace” by which He keeps us safe from our enemies the other “Bonds” He uses to keep us close to Him.

            In 11:12-13 500 years before the event Zechariah prophecies ahead of exact price and details of Judas’ betrayal saying, “So they weighed out for my wages thirty pieces of silver. And the Lord said to me, “Throw it to the potter”–that princely price they set on me. So I took the thirty pieces of silver and threw them into the house of the Lord for the potter.” (Matt. 26:14-16) The exact price according to Exodus 21:32 of the fatal goring of a persons slave by a neighbor’s ox. That is how the religious leaders viewed Jesus just another mans slave! Zechariah predicts a future time when the world will go after a shepherd who will not care for those who are cut off and instead will eat the flesh of the fat and tear their hooves to pieces.

Chapter 12: 12:1 flies in the face of Mormonism as it says that the Lord, “forms the spirit of man within him”, and not that there are spirit babies in heaven awaiting bodies here on earth. At any rate we are told that the nations will attack Israel but that the Lord will protect her. And in that day according to 12:10 God “will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.”

Chapter 13: In 13:1 Zechariah says, “In that day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.” The fountain can only be the blood of Jesus that cleans us from all our sins. And we know this because of what Zechariah sees in 13:6  where they will ask Jesus, “What are these wounds between your arms?’ Then he will answer, ‘Those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends.” In 13:9 God promises that he “will bring the one-third through the fire, will refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘This is My people’; and each one will say, ‘The Lord is my God.‘”

Chapter 14: Zechariah starts this final chapter with a promise saying in 14:1 “Behold, the day of the Lord is coming, and your spoil will be divided in your midst.” At that time He will “go forth and fight against those nations, as He fights in the day of battle”. (14:3) This will lead to what Zechariah sees in 14:9 “And the Lord shall be King over all the earth. In that day it shall be–“The Lord is one,” and His name one.” And we are told in  14:16-17 that “it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles. And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, on them there will be no rain.” “In that day “HOLINESS TO THE LORD” shall be engraved on the bells of the horses. The pots in the Lord’s house shall be like the bowls before the altar.” Zech. 14:20 

1. Chapters 1-6 A night of visions
2. Chapters 7-8 God’s answer to questions
3. Chapters 9-14 A future and a hope

Zechariah is the 2^nd chronologically of the post-exile prophets (Haggai being the first then Malachi). Ezra the priest mentions him twice (5:1 and 6:14) in conjunction with Haggai who prophesied during the same time frame. Unlike Haggai who was born in Jerusalem and exiled in Babylon, Zechariah was born in Babylon and returned to Jerusalem both were part of the 45,000 exiles that traveled hundreds of miles from Babylon after the 70 year captive with Zerubbabel the political leader and Joshua the High Priest.

            Though both Haggai and Zechariah write at around the same time both addressing the abandonment of the rebuilding of the temple for 16 years they do so from a very different approach:

Haggai says: “What do you mean it’s not time to do the Lord’s work”?

Zachariah says: “If you get busy God will bless you with His presence!” 

I. Chapters 1-6 A night of visions

Chapter 1: Based upon 1:1 Zachariah began his prophetic ministry 2 months after Haggai’s for month ministry ended. Zechariah tells us that he is the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo the prophet but Nehemiah calls him the son of Iddo so apparently his father died and he was raised by Iddo who was a priest and a prophet as was his grandson Zechariah. Zechariah’s name means “God will remember”, Berechiah means “God will bless” and Iddo means “at the appointed time”. This could well be the theme of the book and the reason why the nation should get back to work on rebuilding the temple because “God will remember and bless at the appointed time”! Apathy and procrastination’s antidote is for us to realize that God wants to bless us beyond what we can imagine if we would only put our energy into rebuilding our spiritual lives! In 1:3 the Lord says, “Return to Me and I will return to you”! In James 4:8 we read it this way as James says, “Draw close to God, and God will draw close to you.” So how about it folks are you wanting to be blessed beyond measure? In 1:7 God gives Zechariah a series of 8 visions apparently all in one night as 7:1 as Zechariah gives us the next date. 

1. 1:7-17 He sees horses among the Myrtle trees: In 1:8 he see “man sitting on a red horse that was standing among some myrtle trees in a small valley. Behind him were red, brown, and white horses, each with its own rider.” The man is also identified as the “Angel of the Lord” in verse 11 which is a pre-incarnate manifestation of Jesus. The red horse suggests conflict and war and the myrtle trees represent the nation of Israel. The name in Hebrew is the masculine form of the name Esther who in a few years would be saving the Jews in Persia from Haman’s plan. What a great picture this was as the Lord was standing in the midst of His people ready to protect them from any and all opposition. The 70 years
2. 1:18-21 In Zechariah’s 2^nd vision he sees the powerful gentile world ruling powers that Daniel also saw and that he sees four craftsmen who God will use to “nail” them who sought to destroy His people.
3. 2:1-13 Zechariah’s 3^rd vision he again sees Jesus this time with a measuring line taking measurements of the future dimensions of Jerusalem when Jesus will reign as King of Kings. Notice that at this time according to verse 4 Jerusalem will be inhabited as a town with out wall as Jesus will be the glory in her midst. No need for wall of protection as He says in verse 8 “he who touches you touches the apple of His eye.” Why does God describe Israel as the “Apple of His eye”? Well Physiologists tell us that quickest reflex in the human body is to cover our eyes when something is coming at it.
4. 3:1-10 Zechariah’s 4^th vision he sees Joshua standing before Jesus and satan who is accusing Joshua. Folk’s in scripture you will always see satan involved in tow things:
   • Before man he slanders and misinforms us about God
   • Before God he slanders and misinforms God about us

No wonder why Jesus calls him a liar from the beginning! Look at what Jesus has to say to him in 3:2 “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?” Satan accusations was that Joshua just didn’t measure up but Jesus says, it all depends upon how you measure. Jesus says, “This man is like a burning stick that has been snatched from a fire.” He doesn’t call Joshua “Mighty Sequoia” that lives over 2000 years, reaches 380 feet and is 26 feet around. No, God calls him a twig plucked from a fire. Friends, our security and importance is not in who we are but in Whose we are. Then Jesus says in 3:4 “Take away the filthy garments from him. I have removed your iniquity from you, and I will clothe you with rich robes.” The temple may have lied for 16 years untouched but Jesus is reassuring the High Priest Joshua that He saw him in His righteousness not his own. Then Jesus tells him the best news of all that the “BRANCH” is coming (3:9-10)

And when He “I will remove the iniquity of that land in one day. In that day, Everyone will invite his neighbor under his vine and under his fig tree.”

5. 4:1-14 Zechariah’s 5^th vision apparently Zechariah is so wiped out that he has fallen asleep and the Lord has to wake him up to give him this vision. Then the Lord shows him two golden lampstand’ s something that as a priest Zechariah he knew well, accept these lampstand’ s are kept lit by being directly connected to the olive trees so that the priest wouldn’t have to go get the olives crush them to get the oil to keep them lit. Saint’s oil is a picture of the Holy Spirit and has three uses:
6. Eliminates: Friction, just as we are told in Galatians 5:22 that the fruit of the Spirit is love defined by 8 attributes. The Holy Spirit in our lives eliminates the friction of the flesh!   
7. Illuminates: It also brings light to our dark world through enlighting the word of God!    
8. Immunities: Finally the work of the Holy Spirit brings healing to our body, soul and spirit and a fresh moment by moment supply will keep us healthy.

Through Zechariah God encourages the governor Zerubbabel saying in 4:6 “Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord of hosts.” Saint’s it’s not going to come together by huff’n and puff’n, no it’s going to come together by what the Holy Spirit supplies. “He shall bring forth the capstone with shouts of Grace, grace to it” (4:7). It is for this truth that according to 4:10 we shouldn’t “Despise the day of small things….for the eyes of the Lord, scan to and fro throughout the whole earth.”      

6. 5:1-4 Zechariah’s 6^th vision in the previous 5 visions the Lord had encouraged the people about His present and future for them but here He changes this by giving then a vision that suggested that they needed to be trimmed up in order that they would burn brighter. Zechariah sees a scroll 30 feet long and 15 feet wide on which is recorded their sins both against God and there fellow man. This vision speaks to our heart in as much that some times the problem isn’t that we don’t have a supply of the Holy Spirit, no the problem is that we need our wicks trimmed in order that the flame will burn brighter. Saint’s we can cry our to God for more of Him but we need to recognize that for there to be more of Him, more power, more love, more of Him in our lives there will also have to be less of us! Confession is wonderful thing as it will enable us to be supplied with more of Him.
7. 5:5-11 Zechariah’s 7^th vision he sees a large basket used for harvesting and sees that the folks are all caught in commercialism and materialism and the Lord calls is “Wickedness” (verse 8) and then they two it to the world system in the final days where people will worship their wallets instead of the living God.
8. 6:1-8 Zechariah’s 8^th vision where he sees 4 chariots which fits perfectly into revelation 6. This vision was to show the people that God was moving amongst them removing sin, destroying worldliness and preparing them for His return. He sees the return of Israel

The 6^th chapter concludes with the crowning of Joshua the High Priest but it looks beyond this to the crown of yet another Joshua who with not only be priest but prophet and King as well “the Man whose name is BRANCH” and He will build the temple of the Lord, He shall bear glory and shall sit and rule on His throne. Why even those who are far away shall come..!    

1. Chapters 1 A message to hands: “Be productive”
2. Chapter 2:1-9 A message to hearts: “Be patient”
3. Chapter 2:10-23 A message to heads: “Be prosperous”

Haggai is the 2^nd shortest book in the OT (1,131 words in 38 verses in 2 chapters) and is the first chronologically of what is called the post-exile prophets (Zechariah and Malachi being the other two). But don’t let any of that bore you as Haggai was a prophet of action. God called him to prophecy to the people who had begun to repatriate the land of promise after the Babylonian captivity during the reign of Darius the Great, king of Persia who had issued a decree to return during Nehemiah and Ezra’s time. Not much in known of Haggai, he identifies himself as a prophet five times and is 1 of only two of the prophets that does so (Habakkuk being the other one). Based upon Haggai’s book we learn that his ministry only lasted for four months from September 1^st to December 24^th and was only comprised of three sermons each a call to action (five times in two chapters he says that they need to “consider”). His name Haggai means “Festival of God” and suggests that he was born on one of the nations feast days. Ezra the priest mentions him twice (5:1 and 6:14) in conjunction with Zechariah who prophesied during the same time frame but was quite a bit younger. Based upon Haggai’s words in 2:3 where he asks “Who is left among you who saw this temple in its former glory? And how do you see it now? In comparison with it, is this not in your eyes as nothing?” It is believed that Haggai was quite older at the time of his writing as the temple had been destroyed at least 70 years earlier, this may account for his brief ministry.

            That fact alone ought to be enough for us to read this little work of Haggai. Many of us have quite a bit of history behind us and only a few days in front of us but listen up Haggai was a man of few words, but they were non the less words calling the nation to action. Don’t allow the enemy to tell you that you have wasted your life and that it is too late for you to be of any use for God’s kingdom, start now!        

I. Chapters 1 A message to hands: “Be productive”

Chapter 1: This message was given on September 1^st and it seems that Haggai is speaking to the “hands” as they need to be productive. Based upon 1:1, 16 years had elapsed since Zerubbabel the political leader and Joshua the High Priest led a group of 45,000 exiles hundreds of miles from Babylon where they had been captive for 70 years. When they arrived, they were so excited to rebuild the temple that they spent time weeping over its destruction 70 years earlier. Though they had the support of King Cyrus of Persia they soon found that they were facing two types of opposition:

1. External: They had those who dwelt in the land during those 70 years that didn’t want them to rebuild the temple and wrote a letter to the king saying that their plan was to rebuild and then rebel. Nehemiah comes in later to deal with this issue and tells the people to have one hand on the bricks of the wall of the temple and the other on the sword.
2. Internal: They couldn’t seem to get along together to the common good of all and this was further enhanced by outward circumstances such crop failures and other hardships.     

There will always be opposition to our spiritual growth, some of it will be “outside” as those things that demand our attention and time in the world won’t want to let you go especially when it involves rebuilding your spiritual lives. But harder still will be the battle “within” from our own procrastination as our rebuilding our spiritual life will seem just too difficult and as we gain any ground instead of things getting easier they will only seem to become more difficult. Soon we will be tempted to do just as this group did “each to their own” as they became preoccupied with living only for the here and now with now forethought of living for the “here after”. Haggai address this in 1:4-6 as he say’s to them: “Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, and this temple to lie in ruins?” Now therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: “Consider your ways! You have sown much, and bring in little; you eat, but do not have enough; you drink, but you are not filled with drink; you clothe yourselves, but no one is warm; and he who earns wages, earns wages to put into a bag with holes.” The “paneled houses” describe the type of wood working that would only be found in palaces, these folks weren’t just “getting buy” they were “buying and getting”! To clarify the people’s position in 1:2 they weren’t saying not to build, NO they were saying, “We’ll do it later”, “It just doesn’t feel like the right time yet!” Friend’s, the flesh is never going to get to the place that it just says, “Yeh, I want to die to my self-centered ways.” No, that’s why Paul said in Romans 6:11 that we need to “Reckon ourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Procrastination is the greatest enemy to our sanctification; it is never the wrong time to do the right thing! Yet, with their pursuit of the things of this world Haggai says, they were “sowing much and bringing in little” and “earning wages to put into a bag with holes”. They weren’t making what they could have been on their investment because they weren’t putting God first in their lives. I’m not saying that in every case this is true, but it certainly was to those who had returned and had not put their spiritual life first. If all we do is live for ourselves it is the surest way to have an empty life. If you are “sowing much and bringing in little” and “earning wages to put into a bag with holes” why not try sowing to your spiritual life! Lay up for yourself treasure in heaven that way you won’t have to worry about bags with holes. Haggai says in 1:9 “You looked for much, but indeed it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why?” says the Lord of hosts. “Because of My house that is in ruins, while every one of you runs to his own house.” We need to ask, does God’s house in my heart lay in ruins? Perhaps that’s why what we bring home blows away? The solution to this is: Rebuild the temple so that what you bring home won’t blow away!      

            Haggai records the response of the people in 1:12-14 as we read that “Then Zerubbabel and Joshua, with all the remnant of the people, “obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the people feared the presence of the Lord”. And with that obedience the Lord said, “I am with you”. Then the Lord stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel, Joshua and all the remnant of the people and “they came and worked on the house of the Lord of hosts, their God”. Saints, the work of God in rebuilding the temple of our hearts always begins with the same step, obedience! It took only 23 days for the people to begin the work that they had let go for 16 years. The lack was not do too: Time, Talent or Treasure it was a lack of obedience as what they weren’t willing to do for 16 years they started again once they obeyed the word of the Lord 23 days later!

II. Chapter 2:1-9 A message to hearts: “Be patient”

Chapter 2:1-9: This message came out in October and here Haggai speaks to the “hearts” to be patient. In Ezra 3:10-11 16 years earlier when the builders laid the foundation of the temple of the Lord, the priests blew the trumpets, and the Levites banged the cymbals to praise the Lord and all the remnant sang responsively giving thanks to the Lord saying, “He is good, for His mercy endures forever toward Israel.” “Then all the people shouted with a great shout, when they praised the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid.” Now that they had started there were a few old timers like Haggai that could recall the “temple in its former glory? And how do you see it now? In comparison with it, is this not in your eyes as nothing?” (2:3) Oh how easy it is to become discouraged in the work my friends at the rebuilding of your spiritual life as you recall what it once was and see all the work that needs to be done. But Listen to the Lord’s encouragement to be patient and let the Lord rebuild the temple as he says in 2:4-5 where He says, “Yet us now be strong, Zerubbabel,’ says the Lord; ‘and be strong, Joshua, and be strong, all you people of the land,’ says the Lord, ‘and work; for I am with you,’ says the Lord of hosts. ‘According to the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt, so My Spirit remains among you; do not fear!’” Never let, discouragement for what was lost keep you from the hope of what God will do in your heart if you just “Work” because He is with you. In 2:7 God says, “I will shake all nations, and they shall come to the Desire of All Nations, and I will fill this temple with glory,’ says the Lord of hosts.” The temple that Solomon had built was shaken by the presence of God but here God promises that when He comes into this rebuilt temple He will shake the nations. Listen to what He promises in 2:9 “The glory of this latter temple shall be greater than the former,’ says the Lord of hosts. And in this place I will give peace,’ says the Lord of hosts.”  Don’t let regret slow you down, be patient, God’s going to complete what He has planed! So, God speaks through Haggai to the people’s heart to be patient as He will make the latter work greater than the former work. Just when you think you’ve blown it, your washed up, past your prime; God wants you to know not so just keep working you’ll see!     

III. Chapter 2:10-23 A message to heads: “Be prosperous”

Chapter 2:10-23: This is Haggai’s third and final message given in December, aimed at the heads of the people to be prosperous. In verses 10-14 God asks two questions to the priests:

1. “If one carries holy meat in the fold of his garment, and with the edge he touches bread or stew, wine or oil, or any food, will it become holy?” And the priests answered, “No”.
2. “If one who is unclean because of a dead body touches any of these, will it be unclean?” And the priests answered yes, “It shall be unclean.”

The point God is making is that, holiness cannot be passed on, but corruption can. If you hang around sin it’s going to affect you but just simply going to Church won’t make you holy as you have to obey the Lord personally. God wants them to know this before as He says in 2:15 a “stone was laid upon stone in the temple of the Lord” that being busy with the things of God is not the same thing as allowing the Lord to deal with your heart! Ezra tells us that, the nation had been holding religious service for the last 16 years, but they hadn’t been obedient personally the whole time! God doesn’t not want lip service He wants life service! God says in verses 15-19 that all those things that wouldn’t come together in their lives was His way of nudging them back to getting their hearts right. Then He says in 2:19b “But from this day I will bless you” because now in 23 days they had responded. We need to ask ourselves: Are there fruit trees in my life not yielding fruit? I their still seed in my barn. Why not build upon the foundation that was laid in Christ years ago and you will see that from the day you start He will bless!

            Haggai concludes in verse 20-23 with a glorious description of the future glory of His work in the nation. Saints, let’s spend some time asking God to enable us to get to work rebuilding our spiritual lives:

• That our hands will “Be productive”
• That our hearts will “Be patient”
• That our heads will “Be prosperous”

1. Chapters 1-3:8 A bad day
2. Chapter 3:9-20 A good day

Zephaniah speaks to Judah prior to the Babylonian captivity and was a contemporary of Jeremiah. He speaks of the “Day of the Lord” and the coming judgment of the nation but He also speaks of the day of Christ in chapter three. If you read most of the prophets they seem to all follow the same format of judgment then restoration and blessing. To us westerners the day begins with morning and a sun rise followed by a sunset and darkness. Ah but to the Jews the day begins at sunset and ends at sunrise. I like that as Zephaniah begins with the darkness of pending judgment he concludes with the brightness of the coming of Christ. Dear ones perhaps your life feels a little “In the dark” no worries that only means the sun is rising soon.

Zephaniah’s name means God hides or God is hidden and carries the idea “God has treasured” and in spite of this the nation choose to reject the One who had treasured them. Oh how many times we have done the same!     

I. Chapters 1-3:8 A bad day

Chapter 1: In 1:1 Zephaniah lists more of his ancestry then any other prophet tracing it back to the “Hezekiah”, which would make him his great, great grandson; this would also mean that he was the cousin to Josiah. This fact combined with the knowledge that he spoke in the days of Josiah and that his prophecies speak of coming judgment suggest that Zephaniah’s words were most likely responsible for the reforms of Josiah. It is interesting to compare Zephaniah’s words with that of Jeremiah who wrote at the same time as Jeremiah seems to weep with each stroke of his pin where as Zephaniah tends to beat them with a hammer. I find strangely comfort in this as the Lord would by far rather me hum the tune of repentance but will get my attention even if He has to pound it into me.   

According to 1:2-3 God will not only judge Judah He will “utterly consume everything…man and beast…the birds of the heavens…the fish of the sea”. That doesn’t seem fair people say but it’s not God’s fault because God gave Adam dominion over all Hs creation so when Adam and Eve fell they affected all of creation. In Romans 8:20-22 Paul spoke of this saying, “For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.” That is why after the 2^nd coming of Christ we are told in Isaiah 11:6-7 that “The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.”

In verses 1:4-6 we are told the reason for such judgment being that God’s priests worshipped at Baal’s temples, and were into astrology and the worship of all sorts of carnal pleasures. All of this was going to bring them into the “day of the Lord” or the day of judgment as they were in the day of man where they were calling the shots without any real sense of accountability. In verses 10-11 God indited all the classes of Judah saying the upper class was too material, the middle class too vocational and the lower class to carnal. In 1:12 God says through Zephaniah I will “punish the men who are settled in complacency, who say in their heart, ‘The Lord will not do good, nor will He do evil.‘”

Because of this according to 1:13 “their goods shall become booty, and their houses a desolation; they shall build houses, but not inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards, but not drink their wine.” Saints this may not be popular in our state of things in our nation but if you go back a few generations you will see that when our nation becomes indifferent towards God we have an economic down fall. Ah but when we set God back over our checkbooks things turn around!

Zeph. 1:14 Is an interesting verse and much more then it appears in our Bibles. You see it reads “The great day of the Lord is near; it is near and hastens quickly. The noise of the day of the Lord is bitter; there the mighty men shall cry out.” You see some Hebrew scholars have notes that the phrase “there the mighty men shall cry out” can be rendered more accurately “The mighty Man is the Nazarene” and it is this interpretation that has caused many to believe that this is was a Messianic prophecy spoken of in Matthew 2:23 where we are told that Jesus “dwelt in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, “He shall be called a Nazarene.”” Verses 15-18 speak to both the day of the Lord being a day of: trouble, distress, devastation, desolation, darkness and gloominess as well as a day in which a mans wealth will not elevate his judgment.

Chapter 2: This chapter starts out with a call to repentance in 2:3 where Zephaniah says, “Seek the Lord, all you meek of the earth, who have upheld His justice. Seek righteousness, seek humility. It may be that you will be hidden in the day of the Lord’s anger.” The rest of the chapter Zephaniah pronounces God’s judgment upon the surrounding nations in all four directions but he starts with Jerusalem in the first 7 verses. Judgment indeed starts with the House of God!

Chapter 3: The third chapter opens up against Judah saying in 3:2 of Jerusalem that

• She has not obeyed His voice,
• She has not received correction;
• She has not trusted in the Lord,
• She has not drawn near to her God.

The official slogan of the 1973, 25 year anniversary of the rebirth of the Nation of Israel was “Science shall bring peace to the land” 12 months later Israel was attacked by all her neighbors. Saint’s our “hope” is an audacity “arrogant disregard” if it is in politics, science or any other human activity. Let us say as the psalmist in Psalm 42:5 “Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance.” Zephaniah goes on to say in 3:5     “The Lord is righteous in her midst, He will do no unrighteousness. Every morning He brings His justice to light; He never fails, but the unjust knows no shame.”

II. Chapter 3:9-20 A good day

 Chapter 3:9-20: After speaking on the judgment of all nations Zephaniah speaks of the blessings of coming to the Lord as God will regather, redeem and restore so that the people will rejoice in their Redeemer! God will restore their language in verse 9 as well as their boundaries. But More importantly in 3:12-13 God will “leave in your midst a meek and humble people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord. The remnant of Israel shall do no unrighteousness and speak no lies, nor shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth; for they shall feed their flocks and lie down, and no one shall make them afraid.” In 3:14-15 Zephaniah pronounces God’s blessings saying, “Sing, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! The Lord has taken away your judgments, He has cast out your enemy. The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall see disaster no more.”

Then in 3:17 we read a most amazing statement as it says, “The Lord your God in your midst, the Mighty One, will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing.” This is the only verse in the Bible where we directly read of God singing (Matt. 26:30 Jesus sings a Hymn). And what are we told that God sings? Well sings a song of rejoicing over us! Oh dear one we ought all to be acquainted with this song of God for us as it is His song of Love! The 20^th verse concludes with God’s promise to bring back, to gather from among the peoples His people before their eyes; which began in 1948. 

1. Chapters 1-2 Troubled faith
2. Chapter 3 Triumphant faith

Based upon the text we believe Habakkuk was a priest that was involved in worship in the temple, (The third chapter is a psalm). It is believed by most that Habakkuk wrote this book around 609 BC at around 30 years of age and only 23 years before the threefold Babylonian invasion. That means he was a contemporary of Jeremiah and that he lived through the brief time of the revival of the young king Josiah and into the rebellion of Jehoiakim kings of Judah. Josiah was only 8 when he became king and 12 years later when they were doing a little restoration on the temple they found the copy of the word of God which led to reformation of the nation. The tragedy is that the reformation lasted only through the reign of Josiah and proved only to be a “reformation” and not “regeneration”. What is of further interest to me is that it is the words of Habakkuk 2:4 “The just shall live by faith” (recorded three times in the N.T. Rm. 1:17, Gal. 3:11 and Heb. 10:38) were the very words that spawned another “reformation” through Martin Luther and the jury is still out on whether this will be a reformation or a regeneration. Habakkuk’s name means to embrace or cling and in some contexts to wrestle.  

Dear ones Habakkuk’s words to Judah that is in the death throws as a nation speak to a wider application of our hearts as we will find ourselves as Paul spoke in Galatians 5:17 in a personal conflict the flesh against the spirit. Are we going to embrace and cling to the Lord or in a foolish attempt like Jacob wrestle the Lord for control?

I. Chapters 1-2 Troubled faith

Habakkuk in 1:1 introduces himself as a prophet and is one of only two of the prophets in the Bible who identify themselves as a prophet, (the other is Haggai two books away). There may have been more who were called out of the priesthood into being a prophet but these are the only two who say so. The priesthood was ordered and structured, each day they had to follow strict activities as well as special appointed feasts. Ah but the role of a prophet was very different, they were moved by the Spirit to do and say what ever He guided. Isaiah was called to take his clothes off and walk through out the land to get peoples attention so that he could explain to then the “naked truth”. Hosea was told to marry a prostitute so that his life became a living billboard of God’s heart towards those that were “unfaithful” to Him. I’m not sure that there would be many takers in the “school of the prophets” if folks took a serious look at the cost of the calling of those that the Lord placed in this ministry.

Chapter 1: Most of the prophets speak for the Lord but Habakkuk speaks to the Lord and asks in 1:2-4 “How long, O Lord, must I call for help? But you do not listen! “Violence!” I cry, but you do not come to save. Must I forever see this sin and misery all around me? Wherever I look, I see destruction and violence. I am surrounded by people who love to argue and fight. The law has become paralyzed and useless, and there is no justice given in the courts. The wicked far outnumber the righteous, and justice is perverted with bribes and trickery.” The revival of Josiah was gone and now the people had gone back to there former ways the out come was “violence, sin and misery”. The people just wanted to “argue and fight” all because the word of God had become “paralyzed and useless”. How is that possible? Well, Jesus said in John 5:39 “You search the Scriptures because you believe they give you eternal life. But the Scriptures point to me”! Dear ones far too much time has been wasted upon arguments over opinions of the Bible when the world is waiting for us to be transformed by the truths we proclaim!

Notice God replies to Habakkuk’s question in 1:5 “Look among the nations and watch–Be utterly astounded! For I will work a work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you.” Habakkuk says, “God you’re not doing anything!” And God says, “I’m doing so much that you wouldn’t believe Me if I told you”. Oh how many times do we accuse God of not doing anything, of being indifferent or inactive? But God declares it’s not that I’m in active it’s rather that what I’m doing you wouldn’t be able to receive it. This was a great case in point as Habakkuk wanted God to do something about the sin problem in Judea and God says in verse 6 “I’ve got that covered I’m sending the Babylonians and they are terrible and dreadful” To which Habakkuk responds in 1:12 “Are You not from everlasting, O Lord my God, my Holy One? We shall not die. O Lord, You have appointed them for judgment; O Rock, You have marked them for correction.” Dear ones we accuse God of not working then we tell Him we don’t like the work! “You can’t use the Babylonians to judge us they are worse then we are”, complains Habakkuk.

Chapter 2: Habakkuk had complained about God’s inactivity, fussed about God’s work but now he does what we all should do when we discover what Isaiah spoke about in 55:8-9 when God said, “My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.” In 2:1 we see Habakkuk does three things in his prayer:

1. “I will stand my watch”: He is determined to spend time with the Lord, he doesn’t say, “When I get a round to it” instead he says, “I will stand my watch”. I can’t tell you that if you were more determined in prayer that you would get what you ask but I can say that without that determination you can count on the fact that you won’t. Hebrews 11:6 says that “without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”
2. “And set myself on the rampart”: Next I notice the fact that Habakkuk got away to seek the Lord. Sometimes it isn’t that the Lord isn’t speaking to us it’s that we can’t hear form because of all the distractions around us.
3. “And watch to see what He will say to me, and what I will answer when I am corrected”: Finally, I notice that Habakkuk expected an answer and further more was willing to be corrected. It is certain that we will never hear God speak if we don’t trust Him and aren’t willing to say we were wrong.

Right after this prayer God says in 2:2 “Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.” This can mean two things:

• Write this vision so clearly so that the person on the go can easily read it and understand it.
• Write the vision and make it plain so that the person you share it with can get going.

God tells Habakkuk that the vision is for an “appointed time” and even though it may not seem possible yet it will become true. Then he tells us the reason why so many folks miss the Word of God in 2:4 “Behold the proud, his soul is not upright in him; but the just shall live by his faith.” Nebuchadnezzar will be the instrument by which God will judge Judah but his pride will cause him not to see that his end will be the same as Judah’s. God is not saying we “should” live by faith, neither is He saying “I want” you to live by faith. No, He is saying “you WILL” live by faith. Romans 14:23 says “whatever is not from faith is sin.” It is not a mater of trust it is a matter of what or whom your trust is in and if it isn’t in God that you aren’t going to be living.

In verse 6-7 God warns against piling up debt as a means of avoiding the consequences of foolish decisions. God adds four more woes to this in verses 9-20 and concludes by asking Habakkuk 2:18 “What profit is the image, that its maker should carve it, the molded image, a teacher of lies, that the maker of its mold should trust in it, to make mute idols”?

II. Chapter 3 Triumphant faith

Habakkuk in 3:2 says, “O Lord, I have heard your speech and was afraid; O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years! In the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy.” Facing questions and not liking the answers, Habakkuk falls on his knees and prays and prays, “God I’m the one that needs to change!” Saint’s think of how few arguments we would have if that was the cry of our hearts “O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years!” The rest of this chapter is a song of the glory of God. Don’t you love it when our prayer turns from questioning God to asking Him to revive our heart and praise breaks forth? How about it my friends, has your worship become flat, no joy in your praise? Why not ask God to revive your heart? In 3:18 Habakkuk writes “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will joy in the God of my salvation.” Listen saints, the word for “rejoice” here means to “Jump” and the word “Joy” here means to “Spin About”. You see the Jews were very expressive in their worship and they showed their excitement in God with not only words of praise but actions as well. This verse literally reads “Yet I will JUMP in the Lord, I will SPIN ABOUT in the God of my salvation.” Oh how inappropriate some claim but then go to a sporting event and watch folks jump and spin about. I suggest that we ought to be far more willing to jump and spin about in praise to our Lord then at a ball game.

Finally, look at what this kind of praise will do in 3:19, it will signify that “The Lord God is my strength; He will make my feet like deer’s feet, and He will make me walk on my high hills.” Are your feet slipping, need more power, some sure footedness in the slippery slope of life? Try jumping and spinning about in adoration to the King of Kings!  

1. Chapter 1 What God will do
2. Chapter 2 How God will do it
3. Chapter 3 Why God will do it

Ok when was the last time you heard a message taught out of the book of Nahum or for that matter when was the last time you read the three chapter book of Nahum? A great many Christians couldn’t tell you a thing about the book and they probably wouldn’t fare much better after they read it. You see, Nahum writes not to Israel now to Judah but rather he write too the capital of Assyria Nineveh or pending judgment and doom. This would be one book that you may want to put a reference of 2 Tim. 3:16-17 right next to the name of the book. You see Paul told Timothy that “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.” And that includes this little book of judgment upon a foreign city. Nahum presents God as Holy and judgment as certain upon unrepentant hearts. “Hey, wait a minute”, you say, “I thought Jonah went to Nineveh and the whole city repented?” Well they did but that was close 150 years earlier and the Ninevehites had been back up to their old ways for better than 50 years and in fact they had become even worse. Nahum’s name means “comfort” and I bet Jonah prior to his change of heart would have read the cover off this book finding “comfort” in their destruction!  

I. Chapter 1 What God will do

The book starts with this simple introduction in 1:1 “The burden against Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum the Elkoshite.” The only info we are given of Nahum is his location as he is called an “Elkoshite” though we can’t be certain the location it is interesting to note that Capernaum on the Sea of Galilee means “City of Nahum” which would make his home area similar to that of Jonah’s right in the area of first invasion from the people of Nineveh.

            Nahum makes a very important point as to then nature of God in 1:2-3 saying, “God is jealous, and the Lord avenges; the Lord avenges and is furious. The Lord will take vengeance on His adversaries, and He reserves wrath for His enemies; the Lord is slow to anger and great in power, and will not at all acquit the wicked.” God is not jealous of us, He is jealous for us and as such His jealousy will come forth even though He is “slow to anger and great in power” He will not acquit the wicked. People really struggle with this concept of God’s jealousy as Oprah said during one of her shows; “I was raised a Baptist and we were too hung up on traditional ways. I was sitting in church and heard that God is a jealous God. I asked ‘Why?’ Come on-let’s get over it!” It’s apparent that she related God’s “jealousy” in human terms making God to be insecure. Think of it in terms of a doctor who is jealous of cancer in a patient he isn’t jealous of the cancer, he doesn’t wish he had himself! No his jealousy brings him to action against the cancer as He realizes its potential to destroy the person so prescribes actions that though may be painful are designed to eradicate the cancer from the person he cares about. How unfortunate it is that some folks misunderstand God’s patience as indifference and cease that as an opportunity to continue in self destructive ways. Nahum says in 1:7-8 “The Lord is good, A stronghold in the day of trouble; and He knows those who trust in Him.  But with an overflowing flood He will make an utter end of its place, and darkness will pursue His enemies.” Oh how we love the truth of the first part of this verse but seem to think that the 2^nd part contradicts the first. 18 years after Nahum uttered these words the combined armies of the Babylonians and the Medes after a three month siege against the Nineveh gained access. They had given up until God caused it to rain for an extended period of time causing the Tigris river to overflow its banks (Aug. 612 BC.) This in turn weekend the 100 foot high over 50 wide wall which stretched 3 miles long and 1 ½ miles wide. The walls were surrounded on the outside by 150 foot wide 60 foot deep moat with 1200 100 foot towers upon the walls for the archers. What made the Ninevehites even more venerable was that upon seeing the attacking army retreat threw a drunken orgy that lasted for weeks so that as 1:10 says, “while drunken like drunkards” thinking they were safe (verse 12) the invading armies came in through the breach and cut them down.  

            Now take a look at verse 1:15 as we are told, “Behold, on the mountains the feet of him who brings good tidings, Who proclaims peace!” his is also quoted in Isa. 52:7 as well as Roman’s 10:15. The context of this is that of the judgment of the Ninevehites being “good tidings”. Saint’s God’s judgment is good news because it means that He wins and evil loses.

II. Chapter 2 How God will do it

In these 13 verses God speaks through Nahum as to how He will destroy Nineveh saying in 2:3-4 that “The shields of his mighty men are made red, the valiant men are in scarlet.   The chariots come with flaming torches in the day of his preparation, and the spears are brandished. The chariots rage in the streets, they jostle one another in the broad roads; they seem like torches, they run like lightning.” It seems as though Nahum is looking beyond just the destruction of Nineveh to a yet future time during the tribulation and possibly describes tanks. Though the Ninevehites in 2:5-6 “make haste to her walls,

and the defense is prepared” God had “The gates of the rivers are opened, and the palace is dissolved.” This according to 2:8 caused Nineveh of old  to become like a pool of water. So destroyed and ravished was Nineveh according to verse 10 it became empty and desolate and was one of the things skeptics would use to discredit the Bible until 1847 when the city was rediscovered archeologically. What a freighting sentence coming form the Lord is 2:13 where we read the Lord say, “Behold, I am against you”! These words are as true as the words of John 3:16 and ought to cause us to go to a world that has had numerous opportunities to turn to God’s love and away from his wrath. Hebrews 10:31 tells us that “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” Isaiah 55:6 says that we ought to “Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near.”

III. Chapter 3 Why God will do it

Nahum speaks of four reasons why He is going to judge the city:

1. Cruelty 3:1 “Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. Its victim never departs.” They would commit mass murder upon every city they would conquer and pile up the decapitated heads in a pyramid outside the city. They would make deals with the folks inside the city then murder them and take their city.
2. Carnality 3:4 “Because of the multitude of harlotries of the seductive harlot, the mistress of sorceries, who sells nations through her harlotries, and families through her sorceries.” The word “sorceries” is were we get or word “pharmacy” from theirs was a drug culture that led them into satanic and demonic activity.
3. Arrogance 3:8 “Are you better than No Amon that was situated by the River, that had the waters around her, whose rampart was the sea, whose wall was the sea?” This very city in Egypt was attacked the same way by the Assyrians only a few years earlier and yet they didn’t take any lessons form this themselves.
4. Immorality 3:13 “Surely, your people in your midst are women!” Historical records confirm not only widespread immorality it also showed widespread Homosexuality.

The final verses 16-19 describe the leadership of the nation asleep  while the people were being scattered on the mountains. Such an indictment form God upon the Ninevehites should serve as a warning to every nation that has turned away from God.

1. Chapters 1-3 God’s Retribution
2. Chapters 4-5 God’s Restoration
3. Chapters 6-7 God’s Reconciliation

Micah’s ministry lasted 40 years during a time the 10 northern tribes of Israel were engaged in a not so civil war against their southern brothers of Judah and Benjamin. In 2^nd Chron. 28 we are told that in one day’s battle 120,000 men from Judah were killed. Micah’s prophetic ministry is unique as he is the only prophet sent to both kingdoms. His home town Gath lay 25 miles southwest of Jerusalem on the boarder between the two kingdoms in the area of Philistia (the land of the Philistines). Micah 1:1 tells us that Micah prophesied “in the days of Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah” which make him a contemporary of Hosea, Amos and Isaiah. In fact when you compare Isaiah to Micah it appears that he may have been a disciple of Isaiah as Micah 4:1-3 and Isaiah 2:2-4 are a mirror image of each other. Since the two of these prophets wrote about the same things why did God include both in our Bibles? Well I think that both Micah’s Isaiah’s message are so important that they bore repeating and Isaiah being 66 chapters to Micah’s 7 chapters enabled the reader to the abridged version. Interestingly 120 years later as Jeremiah was on the eve of the nations captivity to the Babylonians in 26:18 he chooses to quote Micah (3:12) and not Isaiah.

I. Chapters 1-3 God’s Retribution

Chapter 1: After a brief introduction of himself and the time frame in which he wrote Micah launches into a general declaration of judgment towards Israel. To drive home his point Micha use a play on words that is lost with out the English translations of the Hebrew words:

• 1:10 “Tell it not in Gath, weep not at all; in Beth Aphrah roll yourself in the dust”. Here the play on words is Aphrah as the name of the city is “dust”.
• 1:13 “O inhabitant of Lachish, harness the chariot to the swift steeds (She was the beginning of sin to the daughter of Zion), for the transgressions of Israel were found in you.” Here the play on words is Lachish which means “swift steeds”.
• 1:14 “Therefore you shall give presents to Moresheth Gath; the houses of Achzib shall be a lie to the kings of Israel.” Here the play on words is “houses of Achzib”, which means “a lie”.   

It seems as though God wanted these truths to stick in the minds of the hears of Micah’s prophecies. Ah but look at what he said prior to this in 1:8 where Micha said that these words caused him to “wail and howl” and to feel “stripped and naked” “mourning like the ostriches”. Saints we should not get the impression that those who carried the truth of God in judgment some how were unaffected personally by the truths they spoke. Isaiah 55:11says that God’s “Word that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, but it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.” I’m of the impression that the first place where the word should accomplish its purpose is in the instrument God has used to speak it.

Chapter 2: In spite of their failure God will be faithful and gather a remnant God says in verse 12. How amazing is God’s love towards those who according to 2:8 had “risen up as an enemy”. In 2:12-13 God promises, “I will put them together like sheep of the fold, like a flock in the midst of their pasture; they shall make a loud noise because of so many people. The one who breaks open will come up before them; they will break out, pass through the gate, and go out by it; their king will pass before them, with the Lord at their head.” Our Lord Jesus is the One who broke open the barriers we have set up because of our sin and now our King has passed before us and is our head!

Chapter 3:  In this chapter God speaks through Micha against:

• Princes (1-4) “Who hate good and love evil” verse 3
• False prophets (5-8) “Who make the people stray” verse 5
• Priests (9-12) “Teach for pay, as the prophets spoke for profit” verse 11

It was for this reason that the nation was going to become a heap of ruins. Pail told 2 Timothy in 2 Tim. 4:3 that there would come a time “When they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers”.   

II. Chapters 4-5 God’s Restoration

Chapter 4: For the next two chapters Micha speaks a message of the hope of God’s restoration. In 4:2 Micha predicts that there will come a time when, “Many nations shall come and say, “Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.” For out of Zion the law shall go forth, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” A contrast is made between the people of the world and God’s people in 4:5 where we read that, “All people walk each in the name of his god, but we will walk in the name of the Lord our God forever and ever.” Listen to the promise in 4:6-7 “In that day,” says the Lord, “I will assemble the lame, I will gather the outcast and those whom I have afflicted; I will make the lame a remnant and the outcast a strong nation”. Dear ones is that not what the Lord has done in our lives? He has assembled the lame, the outcast; those afflicted and has made us a strong nation by the indwelling of His Spirit!

Chapter 5: We have given a most remarkable prophecy 700 years before it took place in verse 5:2 as Micha wrote, “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, from everlasting.” Make no mistake about it the priests understood this to be a messianic prophecy as we are told in Matthew 2:5-6 when questioned by Herod’s men with regards to the birth place of the Messiah they gave this prediction. Verse 5:3 predicts their rejection of the long awaited Messiah and His eventual 2^nd coming. And in verses 5:4-5 we are given the Messiahs ministry as it says, “He shall stand and feed His flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God; and they shall abide, for now He shall be great to the ends of the earth; and this One shall be peace.” In verse 7-15 Micha speaks to the remnant that God will one day restore saying in verse 5:7 that they “Shall be in the midst of many peoples, like dew from the Lord, like showers on the grass, that tarry for no man nor wait for the sons of men.” They will be like this because according to verse 5:13 they “shall no more worship the work of your hands”.  

III. Chapters 6-7 God’s Reconciliation

Chapter 6: Here God pleads through Micha for the repentance of the people so that they can be reconciled with their God. God calls His creation (the mountains and the hills) to sit on the jury to judge the nation. In verse 6:2-3 God acts as a prosecuting attorney and asks the mountains to hear the Lord’s complaint saying, “O My people, what have I done to you? And how have I wearied you? Testify against Me.” Micha is also called as a witness in verses 6:7-8 and asks, “Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” Oh little did Micha know that God would do just that! Then he tells the nation “He has shown you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?”

Chapter 7: Micah concludes with a series of promises from the Lord. In verses 7:18-20 he proclaims, “Who is a God like You, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He does not retain His anger forever, because He delights in mercy. He will again have compassion on us, and will subdue our iniquities. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea. You will give truth to Jacob and mercy to Abraham, which You have sworn to our fathers from days of old.”

1. Chapters 1-2 The Prodigal Prophet
2. Chapters 3-4 A Change of Heart

Last week we looked the first of two small books both with prophecies to gentile nations; Obadiah writes to the Edomites (descendants of Esau) and Johan writes of his reluctant missionary journey to the Assyrian capital of Nineveh. Many people are familiar with this book and the first thing they think of is the story of Jonah and the whale but the Bible does not say that it was a whale instead it says that it was a great fish. Further more it is mentioned only 4 times. Another thing people will remember is that it is a book about the preaching in a great city, (Nineveh, which was founded by Noah’s great-grandson Nimrod Gen. 10:8-10), but it is only mentioned 9 times. Still others will remember that it is about a disobedient prophet, yet he is only mentioned 18 times. The most important character in this book is not the fish, a wicked city, or even Jonah. It is God! He is mentioned some 38 times in 4 short chapters. In this book we will look at God working a wonder through us when He would rather work a wonder in us! God is more concerned about His workers than He is about their work, for if the workers are what they ought to be, the work will be what it ought to be. In 2 Kings we find out that Jonah was a prophet during the time of the reigns of Jehoash, to Jeroboam II. During the reign of Jeroboam II the nation was in a time of great prosperity and national pride. They had regained the land that they had lost from wars and raids of the Assyrians’. In fact they had even expanded their boundaries. Yet with that said it was a time of moral & spiritual decay. Since Jonah was not speaking out against the nation like his contemporaries, Amos and Hosea, I’m sure he was quite popular with the people.

I. Chapters 1-2 The Prodigal Prophet

Of further interest is that Jonah was the son of Amittai, who according to 2 Kings was from Gath Hepher, which was a city about 15 miles west of the Sea of Galilee in the territory given to the sons of Zebulun. This was the very land that had regained from wars and raids of the Assyrians and the capital city of Assyrians’ was Nineveh! Having Jonah go to Nineveh to preach to these folks would be about like him going as a Jew to Hitler’s Berlin in the 40’s.

            Look at the message Jonah was to give to this city in verse 2 as he was to “..cry out against it..” because their wickedness had come before the Lord. Well no wonder he ran away from the call, it was a suicide mission. But that wasn’t why Jonah was reluctant according to 4:2 as we are told that Jonah knew that, “You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm.” Jonah was not afraid of the Ninevehites, no, he was afraid of God’s mercy towards them. Notice the downward slide when Jonah decided to disobey in verse 3:

1.) “flee…the presence of the Lord..”: Know matter how you try to cut it when we don’t allow God into areas of our lives, you are fleeing His presence.

2.) “..down to Joppa..”: Joppa was located in the area that was given to the tribe of Dan. which was the first tribe to turn away from God to idolatry. The first downward step we make away from the Lord is to get to an area that is more sympathetic with rebellion. 

3.) “…found a ship going to Tarshish..”: Isn’t it amazing how easy it always is to find a ship going in a direction away from the presence of the Lord? Ask yourselves is this thing I’m heading towards drawing me closer to the presence of the Lord or towards something else? The right direction is always obedience and closeness to God!

4.) “…he paid the fare,..” : Make no mistake about, Jonah paid for his disobedience. The ship may be there waiting but you still are going to have to pay.  

5.) “…went down into it..” : Not only did he go down to Joppa, but here he goes down even further into the boat. Notice it says that Jonah went “with them” a bunch of idolaters.

            God’s response to Jonah’s disobedience is to send, “A STORM”. I love the fact that God loves us too much too ever let us leave His presence! Folks, if you think back over your life you will find many times that God has sent a storm upon your life to get you to turn back to Him! God not only sent a storm he prepared a “great fish” to swallow Jonah. The greater miracle of God’s is His grace in sending the fish to save Jonah! Jonah is being saved not because he deserves it, but rather because God loves Jonah, a prodigal prophet who would rather die then surrender to the will of God. Hey folks, if God will go to those lengthens for Jonah He will do the same for you!

Chapter 2: There are some who believe that Jonah was actually drowned in the sea, as (verse 5 where Jonah says that the waters encompassed me even to my soul) further more in  verse 6 Jonah says that God has, “brought up his life from the pit.” The salvation of Jonah was from the Lord by way of a “fish”. Can you imagine Jonah telling this story years later? “I was drowning and went un-conscience and when I awoke I was inside this smelly slick and gooey thing, I later realized that it was a great fish!” “You might that the Lord saved me though this fish.” I’ve heard of a COD-FISH but this is the first GOD-FISH. Often times it is the things that we think are going to destroy us that God uses to bring us back to Life!

Verse 10: I’m so glad that if the Lord is trying to speak to me and I won’t listen then He will speak to a dumb fish and it will. Jonah’s rebellion caused him to be treated as a foreign substance. It just goes to show us that disobedience in our lives ought to be something that we just can’t swallow! Jonah may have felt as though he was heading no where but the great fish took him right where God wanted him to be right back dealing with his own prejudice.      

II. Chapters 3-4 A Change of Heart

In these first four verses we are going to deal with how the Lord treats Jonah after his repentance, but first let me make a simple observation: CHANGE IS NOT EASY!

Verse 1 reads, “Now the Word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time,..” This sentence gives me great hope because it shows us how God treats His children when they blow it and then come back to Him! God does not refuse to speak to him, the moment Jonah repents the “Word of the Lord comes..” In verse 2 see that this is almost the exact commission that the Lord gave Jonah in chapter 1:2, except that this time the Lord only tells him to go. When Jonah was told what he was to say he ran this time God tells him to go then He will give him the message. Folk’s God is willing to work with us for He will only give us what he can handle. In verse 3 we are told what Jonah does with the Word of God as he, “arose and went”. This is what God wants from those who stumble and fall, “ARISE & GET GOING”. 

            Now notice what Jonah says in verse 4, “Yet forty days, and Nineveh will be overthrown.” This word here used for “overthrown” is the exact word used to describe the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. But I think that there was another reason for the reaction of repentance in the Ninevehites. Can you just imagine this guy coming into your city, hairless and bleached white. Perhaps Jonah’s story of rebellion had already reached Nineveh. Some guys were out there fishing from the shore when the fish belched Jonah onto the beach. “Man what happen to you?” “Well you see I was sent to preach against Nineveh and I didn’t want to go so I went the opposite direction, and a storm was going to sink my boat so I went overboard was drown, then this fish swallowed me up and while in the fish I repented.” “So all this happened because you were disobedient to Gods plan in your life?” “Yep!” I believe that Jonah’s message was received not just for the content but because they could see in Jonah the truth of what he taught, that rebellion and sin doesn’t look good, or smell good and if you continue down that road it will eventually kill you! When they heard Jonah’s message and saw him they were looking at a man who had been dead and was now alive. And thought; “If God would forgive Jonah when he did not deserve it maybe He will forgive us when we don’t deserve it!” 

Chapter 4: How strange this first verse is in light of the success Jonah’s message had upon the Ninevehites; one would think that he would have been incredibly pumped up after 600,000 people got saved! Yet we read that Jonah was not glad, he was mad! 

Let me suggest to you two reasons:

1. Jonah hated the Ninevehites, they were the most vicious people in the history of man kind and Jonah had witnessed their brutality first hand in his life as they came in with their raiding parties to his home town first.
2. Jonah’s message was more of a prophecy then an opportunity to respond, (Forty days and you die!). So when Jonah saw the reaction of the city he knew that his reputation was going to go down hill.

In verse 2 we are told why Jonah is mad at God, “for I know that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, One who relents from doing harm.” Now that does not seem to be something that you or I would normally protest about God. “Lord I’m just so ticked at you and do you know why? Well of coarse you do, Your just to darn good, kind, caring, loving, patient, &  forgiving. I want you to cut that out!” Jonah hates Gods grace towards those that he hates! Jonah has a great grasp upon the character of God here, but he had no grasp at all of how that should impact his own life towards others! Jonah’s is so bummed that he prays that God would just take his life. Now this would have been so much better if instead of asking God to take his physical life Jonah would have asked God to take control of his life so that his flesh might die. Instead Jonah says to God, “Shed Your grace upon those guy’s; over my dead body!” Oh how great it would have been if Jonah would of prayed, “Shed Your grace upon those guy’s; over the death to my self!” Folks, that’s our battle!

Vs. 4-5 I love this questing of the Lord here. God is trying to get Jonah to look at where his heart is at. So what does Jonah do? Well he goes for a walk up a hill that over looks the city. Why? Well verse 5 says that he waits to see what would happen to the city! Jonah is still hopping that Ninevehites might have been faking it. I’m of the opinion that Jonah waited there 40 days because that is how long he had told them they had until they were destroyed. So Jonah finds a good spot to over look the fireworks!

Vs. 6-8 God “prepares” three pieces of the puzzle for Jonah so that he might see the whole picture.

1.) Vs. 6 A blessing: As Jonah made that little lean too so that he could watch the fire works in the city below but it got hot, so the Lord prepared a plant to bless Jonah. It says here that God saw that Jonah was in misery. Did Jonah deserve to be blessed? His attitude stunk, he had no compassion on those guys, and in fact he wanted them to be toast! You might say that he wanted them torched but he did not want to be scorched! So what does the Lord do with Jonah? Well, He blesses him with comfort when Jonah least deserved it. To show Jonah that grace is never shed upon the deserving, only upon the undeserving! God is showing Jonah first hand that grace is un-merited, undeserving, unearned favor! So God goes out and blesses Jonah not because he was worthy of it, not because of anything Jonah had done, but rather in spite of everything he had done! Do you realize that this is the first time Jonah has been happy in this book, and it’s over a gourd!

2.) Vs. 7 A Loss: God prepares a worm to destroy what He had provided to bless Jonah. To show Jonah that he should not value the temporal above the eternal. The problem with Jonah was that he like us was far too comfortable with Jonah! Jonah was all caught up in earning Gods blessing, but had he done anything to earn the plant that provided him shelter? Jonah didn’t plant the vine nor water it. He just enjoyed the benefits of it. Folks, God is going to strip away from you the things that you value above Him.

3.) Vs. 8 A change: If you are out in the hot sun and a scorching wind kicks up to where you start growing faint what would you do? You would MOVE! That’s what God does here He sends this wind upon Jonah to get him to move. Jonah should have been down in the city ministering to all the new believers, but his heart was not in the right place.

God prepares:

• A plant to reveal His heart of grace!
• A worm to reveal the heart of Jonah!
• And a east wind to get Jonah to move from his heart to Gods heart!

Jonah wishes for physical death when he should have been doing to himself spiritually! Oh Folks, if we just change a few words around here with Jonah’s statement we would have it: “It is better for me to die to myself, so that I might live!”   

IV.) Vs. 9-11 Plants Or People?

Vs. 9 Now Jonah did not answer Gods first question, so God again asks it only this time He asks it with reference to the plant that Jonah loved. Now if I was God I would have said, “Jonah, your gourd for nothing!” Jonah’s only happiness was in a plant! now that’s sad, but you know what I’ve sure let things rip off my joy, how about you? Poor Old Jonah out of his gourd over a gourd!

Vs. 10-11 Jonah, preached a message that brought a whole city to faith in God, yet he did not love a single one that preached to yet He loved a plant that he had nothing to do with. Jonah loved a plant for what it gave to him and he hated the people for what they did to him. Lastly God reveals to Jonah that there are 120,000 children there that did not know right from wrong. He had grieved over a gourd dying, but not about 120,000 children dying! Does this make you uncomfortable, because it sure does me.

1. Chapter 1: 1-18 The End of Edom
2. Chapter 1:19-21 Future blessing of Israel

The next two books on our tour through the Bible are two small prophecies to gentile nations, Obadiah writes to the Edomites (descendants of Esau) and Johan writes of his reluctant missionary journey to the Assyrian capital of Nineveh. These two prophets had very different results as well:

• Obadiah’s 21 verse book pronounces certain judgment without any hope of forgiveness (albeit it took 1,000 years before it was fulfilled).
• Jonah’s four chapter book speaks certain judgment to a city that repents much to Jonah’s dismay.  

Not much is know of Obadiah or the time frame in which he wrote. There are 13 Obadiah’s in the Bible but only four of those have any possibility of being the author of the book and it is quite possible that he is none of the four. The name means “Servant of God” and he writes the shortest book in the O.T. and very likely chronologically the earliest of the prophetic writings. He makes no mention of his ancestry or his home town so he most likely was not of a priestly or royal linage. Most scholars believe that he was a contemporary of Elisha and wrote a few years before Joel did.

            Since Obadiah does not write to Israel and his prophetic words of Edom’s destruction have been fulfilled which he out lines in verse 10 saying “For violence against your brother Jacob, shame shall cover you, and you shall be cut off forever” why should we bother with these 21 verses at all? I suppose many will think me liberal for saying what perhaps only a few are thinking but I’m afraid many today wonder about the relevance of the Bible in general and the inspiration of certain passages or books specifically. What application can be made towards our lives today from only around 600 words to a nation that doesn’t even exist? Someone has well said that “A sermon’s strength is not necessarily proportionate to its length!” Such is the case with this the smallest of the so called minor prophets! Far to often we tend to evaluate the impact of something based upon it’s size but consider the diamond next to the granite bolder, one is a gem the other a mere big rock! So let’s mine the treasure of Obadiah’s 21 verses!       

II. Chapter 1: 1-18 The End of Edom

It takes Obadiah very little time before he tells Edom the reason for their coming destruction in verse 3 when he says, “The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who dwell in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high; you who say in your heart, who will bring me down to the ground?” Edom main city was the rock city of Petra in modern day Jordan. The city was inside a volcano with only entrance coming from a very narrow passage (about 9-13 feet across) which winds around through step cliffs for over a mile until it opens up into a large natural amphitheater which walls have been carved into living quarter for over 100,000 thousand. The Edomites thought Petra impregnable as it was easily defended by 12 men. Edom’s pride in their security was the cause of their downfall. Such a self-sufficiency according to verse 10 had brought about “violence against your brother Jacob” as well as according to verse 12 indifference when Israel was taken captive as well rejoicing “over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction” and speaking “proudly in the day of distress”. According to Proverbs 6:16-17 the number one thing Lord hates is “A proud look”, as it is what keeps men from God and one another. Edom had everything going for it as they had a great fortress in which to protect its self, tremendous ingenuity as they had built a complete city out of rock and had managed to have vegetable gardens with no known direct water source through aqueducts. They had commerce as they were in direct path of the trade roots. Yet with all of this going for them they became arrogant which led to indifference which led to out and out violence to against others.

            Oh dear ones how often has this scene of Edom played out in nations as well as individual lives? God’s blessings are meant to be blessings to others and never to be seen as some sort of entitlement especially as it would lead to miss treating others! Paul wrote to the Corinthians’ in 1 Cor. 6:7 “The very fact that you have lawsuits among you means you have been completely defeated already. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated?” This attitude between Edom and Israel went way back to Esau and Jacob and the battle over that which Esau never wanted to be spiritual leader. Why these two were true sibling rivals as we are told that they were fighting in the womb. Far too common is such fighting amongst what should be spiritual brethren. In Mark 9:38-41 Jesus disciples said, “Teacher, said John, “we saw a man driving out demons in your name and we told him to stop, because he was not one of us. Do not stop him, Jesus said. No one who does a miracle in my name can in the next moment say anything bad about me, for whoever is not against us is for us. I tell you the truth, anyone who gives you a cup of water in my name because you belong to Christ will certainly not lose his reward.”

            By way of application every believer has two natures one of pride the other of humility. Paul spoke of this in Galatians 5:16-17 saying “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.” He said in Col. 3:9 that we are to “put off the old man with his deeds” and in Ephes. 4:22 tells the reason for this the “the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts” therefore in Romans 6:6 Paul reminds us “that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.” When Obadiah speaks of Edom being cit off forever to too must we to need to “reckon ourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:11)  Now such action on our part brings us to the final section of Obadiah’s prophecy the blessings of Israel.

II. Chapter 1:19-21 Future blessing of Israel

Dear ones there is a direct correlation to personal fulfillment in God’s blessing upon our lives and the continual dying to the “old man” of pride. Could our lack be do to what James spoke of this saying in James 4:3 “You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures”? Until the destruction of our prideful Edom we shall never posses the mountains of Esau, nor the fields. God longs to expand the boarders of His children if only they would cut off the Edom and his arrogance. It is at that time that captives shall posses all the cities.             Pride causes us independence from God. Edom became arrogant because they dwelt in the rock but she could have Known the security of dwelling upon the Rock! And such a heart kept Edom form the blessings God would have lavished upon her. But pride also caused Edom to be insensitive to those around them even their own family. Instead of seeing that God had blessed them to be a blessing Edom thought of their blessings as coming from their own resources and as such saw themselves superior to those around them as they became indifferent, mocking and even participating in the suffering of others. Oh let us learn the lessons spoken by Obadiah lest we become like Edom instead of Israel.