Zephaniah 3:8 - Meaning and Application

Jerusalem looked very bad in the verses before this. She had gained a bad reputation, and she seemed beyond correction, beyond healing, and beyond either mercy or judgment. You might expect the next word to be that God would give her up completely, like useless silver. Since prophets and providences had not changed her, you might think she should be left as a ruin, like the nations around her.

But we should pause and marvel at the riches of God’s grace. He often uses human sin to show his own glory even more clearly. They kept growing worse, so the Lord says, “Therefore, wait for me” (Zephaniah 3:8). Since the law could not make anything perfect, the bringing in of a better hope would do it. So those who grieve over the church’s corruption are told to wait for God, until he sends his Son to save his people from their sins, and until he sends the gospel to reform and cleanse his church and make for himself a people set apart from both Jews and Gentiles.

Some did wait in this way, looking for redemption, for this redemption in Jerusalem. Their long-awaited hope finally came (Luke 2:38). Christ also came into the world for judgment (John 9:39). That means he came, first, to judge and defeat what had been done against his church. He will bring down and destroy its enemies, especially its spiritual enemies. The destruction of Babylon and other oppressors in the Old Testament was a picture of this and a welcome sign of what was coming.

He will rise to the prey, leading captivity captive (Psalm 68:18), conquering and plundering the powers of darkness and the earthly powers that set themselves against the Lord and his anointed. He will break them with a rod of iron (Psalm 2:5, 9; Psalm 11:5, 6). His purpose is to gather the nations and assemble the kingdoms. Through the preaching of Christ’s gospel to every creature, all nations are, in a sense, summoned to stand before the Lord Jesus, who is setting up his kingdom in the world.

But since most people will not obey that summons, he will pour out his anger on them. The one who does not believe is already condemned. When the Messiah’s kingdom is set up, there will be distress among the nations, with confusion and fear (Luke 21:25), and there will be great trouble, such as has never been before and never will be again (Matthew 24:21). Then God pours out his indignation, his fierce anger, because of the world’s rage against the Messiah and his kingdom (Psalm 2:1, 2). Then the whole earth is devoured by the fire of his jealousy, because both Jews and Gentiles will be called to account for their hostility to the gospel.

The powers of this world will be stripped and displayed in shame, and the victorious Redeemer will triumph over them. Those who keep living for earthly things after God has set up the kingdom of heaven among people will end in destruction (Philippians 3:19). They will be devoured by the fire of God’s jealousy.

Second, Christ comes to correct what is wrong in his church. When God means to restore Israel and renew their peace and prosperity, he first makes a way by reforming them and reviving their virtue and godliness. That is how God works, both with individual people and with whole communities. He first makes them holy, and then he makes them happy.

These promises were partly fulfilled after the Jews returned from Babylon. Their captivity cured them of idolatry, and that was the main result, the taking away of sin. But the words also look ahead to the blessed results of the gospel and its grace, to these times of reformation in which we live (Hebrews 9:10).

First, there is a promise of reform in speech, which had become widely corrupt, but would then be “seasoned with grace” (Zephaniah 3:9). God says, “Then I will change the speech of the people into a pure language.” He will turn them away from the evil talk that had nearly ruined good manners among them. Converting grace cleans up speech, not by making people clever, but by making what they say wise.

Among the Jews after the captivity, there was a need to reform their way of speaking, because they had mixed the language of Canaan with that of Ashdod (Nehemiah 13:24). That trouble would be corrected. But the promise goes farther. Their speech would be cleansed of all profanity, filth, and lies. Some read it as “a choice language.” They would not speak carelessly, but thoughtfully and with care. They would choose their words well.

A tone of purity and godliness in everyday conversation is a very good sign for any people. Where God gives a pure language to people who once had unclean lips, he will also give other graces and other blessings.

Second, the worship of God, according to his will, will be followed more closely and more together. Instead of sacrifice and incense, they will call on the name of the Lord. Prayer is the spiritual offering by which God must be honored. To prepare us for that duty, we need a pure language. We are not fit to take God’s name on our lips unless those lips are pure.

Purifying speech in daily life is needed if the words of our mouth and the thoughts of our heart are to be acceptable in devotion. How can sweet water and bitter water come from the same spring? (James 3:9-12). It is also promised that, once their speech is purified, they will serve God with one consent, or, as the word suggests, with one shoulder, like oxen in a yoke pulling together. When Christians are united in God’s service, the work goes forward gladly. This unity grows out of pure speech, speech cleansed of anger, envy, and harsh criticism. Purity leads to unity. A change in conduct is the way to a wider and more united church. The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable.

Third, those who had been driven from God will return to him and be accepted by him (Zephaniah 3:10). From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, that is, from Egypt, as in Isaiah 18:1, or from some very far country, my worshipers, the daughter of my scattered people, will bring me an offering. Those who had lived so far away that they had nearly forgotten God and their duty to him will be brought to remember him again, like the prodigal son in the far country remembering his father’s house.

Those who had been scattered under signs of God’s displeasure might fear coming back to him. Yet even they will be gathered under his wings. The daughter of his scattered people, though far away, will be found among those whom the Lord our God will call. And though they are scattered, he will claim them as his own. By calling them “my scattered people,” he gives them honor that more than makes up for the shame of their dispersion.

These people will come with humble petitions, for they are my worshipers.

True converts are people who come to God asking for mercy. They do not argue their own case before their Judge, but they humble themselves and plead for grace (Job 9:15). Wherever they are, even if they are far away, beyond the rivers of Ethiopia, God still sees them and hears them. They are his own suppliants, his humble petitioners.

They also bring spiritual sacrifices. They offer themselves to God as living sacrifices (Romans 12:1). The conversion of the Gentiles is even called the offering up of the Gentiles (Romans 15:16). Along with themselves, they bring the gospel sacrifices of prayer, praise, and alms, and God is pleased with these.

God also promises to purge sin and sinners from among them (Zephaniah 3:11). He will remove their rightful shame. “In that day you will not be ashamed for all your deeds.” They will still be ashamed in the sense of being penitent, and they will remain humble, as in Ezekiel 16:63. But they will no longer be ashamed as people who keep falling back into sin. Their guilt is taken away by God’s forgiving mercy, and the shame of sin is lifted from their conscience. That conscience is then cleansed, settled, and washed from dead works.

When wickedness is common in a nation, the few good people in it are ashamed of what surrounds them and of their land. But when sinners are turned back to God and the land is reformed, that shame, and its cause, are removed. God will also take away their false pride. He will remove from among them not only the open sinners, who are a disgrace to the land, but also the hypocrites, who look good on the outside and rejoice in their pride, the pride connected with the holy city and the holy house. These things were truly Israel’s glory, but the people turned them into an excuse for pride and felt secure in their sin. They trusted in them as if they were their righteousness and strength, boasting, “This is the temple of the Lord” (Jeremiah 7:4). They grew proud because of the holy mountain, looked down on others, and acted as if God’s judgments could not touch them. Church privileges, when people do not use them rightly, often become a reason for pride and a false sense of safety. Nothing offends God more than pride built on claims of holiness, and he will silence it and take it away.

God will also leave a remnant, a small remaining group, of holy, humble, serious people among them who will know the comfort of belonging to him (Zephaniah 3:12). “I will leave in your midst an afflicted and poor people.” When the Chaldeans took the Jews into captivity, they left some of the poor of the land behind to work as vine dressers and farmers. That became a picture of God’s chosen remnant, whom he sets apart for himself. They are afflicted and poor, low in this world, and these are the people God has chosen (James 2:5). The poor receive the good news, and they are poor in spirit, low in their own eyes, and burdened by sin. They are God’s own remnant, because he has reserved them for himself, as in Romans 11:4-5. And they will trust in the name of the Lord.

Those whom God plans to honor with his name, he also teaches to trust in that name. The greater their troubles and poverty in this world, the more reason they see to trust God, because they have nothing else to rely on (1 Timothy 5:5). This chosen remnant will also be blessed with purity and peace (Zephaniah 3:13). In their words and actions, they will be pure. They will do no wrong and speak no lies. Justice and truth will govern them, even when honesty goes against their worldly interest. They will not merely avoid a direct, deliberate lie. No deceitful tongue will be found in their mouths, and not even the smallest trickery will come from them.

They will also be blessed with peace. As sheep in God’s pasture, they will feed and lie down, and no one will make them afraid. They will not live in fear, and the people around them will not frighten them. Those who are careful not to do wrong do not need to fear disaster, because disaster cannot truly harm them. That is why it should not terrify them.