The Minor Prophets

All introductions are from THE MESSAGE by Eugene Peterson

Introduction to HOSEA

We live in a world awash in love stories. Most of them are lies. They are not love stories at all—they are lust stories, sex-fantasy stories, domination stories. From the cradle we are fed on lies about love. This would be bad enough if it only messed up human relationships—man and woman, parent and child, friend and friend—but it also messes up God-relationships. The huge, mountainous reality of all existence is that God is love, that God loves the world. Each single detail of the real world that we face and deal with day after day is permeated by this love. But when our minds and imaginations are crippled with lies about love, we have a hard time understanding this fundamental ingredient of daily living, “love,” either as a noun or as a verb. And if the basic orienting phrase “God is love” is plastered over with cultural graffiti that obscure and deface the truth of the way the world is, we are not going to get very far in living well. We require true stories of love if we are to live truly. Hosea is the prophet of love, but not love as we imagine or fantasize it. He was a parable of God’s love for his people lived out as God revealed and enacted it—a lived parable. It is an astonishing story: a prophet commanded to marry a common whore and have children with her. It is an even more astonishing message: God loves us in just this way—goes after us at our worst, keeps after us until he gets us, and makes lovers of men and women who know nothing of real love. Once we absorb this story and the words that flow from it, we will know God far more accurately. And we will be well on our way to being cured of all the sentimentalized and neurotic distortions of love that incapacitate us from dealing with the God who loves us and loving the neighbors who don’t love us.

HOLMAN’S COMMENTARY: Based on information gleaned from his book, Hosea was from the Northern Kingdom of Israel. His familiarity with place names, religious practices, and political conditions in Israel suggests that he was a native. Internal evidence suggests that Hosea’s ministry continued from the last days of Jeroboam II to near the end of the Northern Kingdom (approximately 750-725 B.C.). Hosea’s prophetic ministry included the period of Near Eastern history when Assyria emerged as a new world empire under the capable leadership of Tiglath-pileser III (745-727 B.C.). Hosea rebuked efforts at alliance with Assyria and Egypt as the means to national security. Hosea had the unenviable task of presiding over the death of his beloved nation, but he held out hope of national revival based on radical repentance.

Hosea 1:2 - 7 (NRSV) 2When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the LORD said to Hosea, “Go, take for yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the LORD.” 3So he went and took Gomer daughter of Diblaim, and she conceived and bore him a son. 4And the LORD said to him, “Name him Jezreel [“God sows”] for in a little while I will punish the house of Jehu for the blood of Jezreel, and I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. 5On that day I will break the bow of Israel in the valley of Jezreel.” 6She conceived again and bore a daughter. Then the LORD said to him, “Name her Lo-ruhamah,[“not pitied”] for I will no longer have pity on the house of Israel or forgive them. 7But I will have pity on the house of Judah, and I will save them by the LORD their God; I will not save them by bow, or by sword, or by war, or by horses, or by horsemen.” 8When she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she conceived and bore a son. 9Then the LORD said, “Name him Lo-ammi,[Not my people] for you are not my people and I am not your God.”
Hosea 14:4 - 7 (NRSV) ⁴ I will heal their disloyalty; I will love them freely, for my anger has turned from them. 5 I will be like the dew to Israel; he shall blossom like the lily, he shall strike root like the forests of Lebanon. 6 His shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be like the olive tree, and his fragrance like that of Lebanon. 7They shall again live beneath my shadow, they shall flourish as a garden; they shall blossom like the vine, their fragrance shall be like the wine of Lebanon.
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THE NATURE OF GOD’S LOVE? HOW HAVE YOUR EXPERIENCED IT?

Introduction to JOEL

When disaster strikes, understanding of God is at risk. Unexpected illness or death, national catastrophe, social disruption, personal loss, plague or epidemic, devastation by flood or drought, turn men and women who haven’t given God a thought in years into instant theologians. Rumors fly: “God is absent” … “God is angry” … “God is playing favorites, and I’m not the favorite” … “God is ineffectual”

It is the task of the prophet to stand up at such moments of catastrophe and clarify who God is and how he acts. If the prophet is good—that is, accurate and true—the disaster becomes a lever for prying people’s lives loose from their sins and setting them free for God. Joel is one of the good ones: He used a current event in Israel as a text to call his people to an immediate awareness that there wasn’t a day that went by that they weren’t dealing with God. The event that Joel used as his text was a terrible locust plague that was devastating the crops of Israel, creating an agricultural disaster of major proportions. He compared it to a massive military invasion. He projected it onto a big screen and used it to focus the reality of God in the lives of his people. Then he expanded the focus to include everything and everyone everywhere—the whole world crowded into Decision Valley for God’s verdict. This powerful picture has kept God’s people alert to the eternal consequences of their decisions for many centuries.

There is a sense in which catastrophe doesn’t introduce anything new into our lives. It simply exposes the moral or spiritual reality that already exists but was hidden beneath an overlay of routine, self-preoccupation, and business as usual. Then suddenly, there it is before us: a moral universe in which our accumulated decisions—on what we say and do, on how we treat others, on whether or not we will obey God’s commands—are set in the stark light of God’s judgment.

In our everyday experience, right and wrong and the decisions we make about them seldom come to us neatly packaged and precisely defined. Joel’s prophetic words continue to reverberate down through the generations, making the ultimate connection between anything, small or large, that disrupts our daily routine, and God, giving us fresh opportunity to reorient our lives in faithful obedience. Joel gives us opportunity for “deathbed repentance” before we die, while there is still time and space for a lot of good living to the glory of God.

HOLMAN’S COMMENTARY Two approximate dates generally are given as the possible times of the authorship of the book, either before the Exile around the time of the boy-king Joash (about 836-796 B.C.) or after the return from Exile (about 500-400 B.C.). The position of the book among the early prophets in the Hebrew canon is considered as evidence for an early date. Also, the omission of a king’s name would be appropriate if a young boy such as Joash had not achieved maturity.

Joel 1:13 - 15 (NRSV) 13Put on sackcloth and lament, you priests; wail, you ministers of the altar. Come, pass the night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God! Grain offering and drink offering are withheld from the house of your God. 14 Sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land to the house of the LORD your God, and cry out to the LORD. 15Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is near, and as destruction from the Almighty it comes.

Joel 2:25 - 32 (NRSV) 25I will repay you for the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent against you. 26You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the LORD your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame. 27You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I, the LORD, am your God and there is no other. And my people shall never again be put to shame. 28Then afterward I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. 29Even on the male and female slaves in those days, I will pour out my spirit. 30I will show portents in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. 31The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD comes. 32Then everyone who calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved; for in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the LORD has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the LORD calls.

WHEN HAVE YOU EXPERIENCED AN EVENT THAT BROUGHT YOU CLOSER TO GOD AND HELPED YOU DEEPEN YOU RELATIONSHIP TO GOD?

Introduction AMOS

Morepeople are exploited and abused in the cause of religion than in any other way. Sex, money, and power all take a back seat to religion as a source of evil. Religion is the most dangerous energy source known to humankind. The moment a person (or government or religion or organization) is convinced that God is either ordering or sanctioning a cause or project, anything goes. The history, worldwide, of religion-fueled hate, killing, and oppression is staggering. The biblical prophets are in the front line of those doing something about it.

The biblical prophets continue to be the most powerful and effective voices ever heard on this earth for keeping religion honest, humble, and compassionate. Prophets sniff out injustice, especially injustice that is dressed up in religious garb. Prophets see through hypocrisy, especially hypocrisy that assumes a religious pose. Prophets are not impressed by position or power or authority. They pay little attention to what men and women say about God or do for God. They listen to God and rigorously test all human language and action against what they hear. Among these prophets, Amos towers as defender of the downtrodden poor and accuser of the powerful rich who use God’s name to legitimize their sin.

None of us can be trusted in this business. If we pray and worship God and associate with others who likewise pray and worship God, we absolutely must keep company with these biblical prophets. We are required to submit all our words and acts to their passionate scrutiny to prevent the perversion of our religion into something self-serving. A spiritual life that doesn’t give a large place to the prophet-articulated justice will end up making us worse instead of better, separating us from God’s ways instead of drawing us into them.

Amos 7:12 - 15 (NRSV) 12And Amaziah said to Amos, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, earn your bread there, and prophesy there; 13but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” 14Then Amos answered Amaziah, “I am no prophet, nor a prophet’s son; but I am a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees, 15and the LORD took me from following the flock, and the LORD said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

Amos 2:6 - 8 (NRSV) 6Thus says the LORD: For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment; because they sell the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals— 7 they who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth, and push the afflicted out of the way; father and son go in to the same girl, so that my holy name is profaned; 8they lay themselves down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge; and in the house of their God they drink wine bought with fines they imposed.

Amos 5:21 - 24 (NRSV) 21I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. 22Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. 23Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. 24 But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

THE MESSAGE OFFERS SOME EVOCATIVE AND PROVOCATIVE STATEMENTS IN THE INTRODUCTION…HOW DOES RELIGION GO WRONG? HOW DO YOU TEST ALL HUMAN LANGUAGE AND ACTION AGAINST THE WILL AND WISDOM OF GOD?

REFLECTING ON THE STATUS AND CLASS AND EDUCATION OF AMOS, WHAT DOES THAT SAY ABOUT GOD?

Introduction to OBADIAH

It takes the entire Bible to read any part of the Bible. Even the brief walk-on appearance of Obadiah has its place. No one, whether in or out of the Bible, is without significance. It was Obadiah’s assignment to give voice to God’s word of judgment against Edom. Back in the early stages of the biblical narrative, we are told the story of the twins Jacob and Esau (Genesis 25–36). They came out of the womb fighting. Jacob was ancestor to the people of Israel, Esau ancestor to the people of Edom. The two neighboring peoples, Israel mostly to the west of the Jordan River and Dead Sea and Edom to the southeast, never did get along. They had a long history of war and rivalry. When Israel was taken into exile—first the northern kingdom by the Assyrians in 721 b.c. and later the southern kingdom by the Babylonians in 586 b.c.—Edom stood across the fence and watched, glad to see her old relative get beat up.

At first reading, this brief but intense prophecy of Obadiah, targeted at Edom, is a broadside indictment of Edom’s cruel injustice to God’s chosen people. Edom is the villain and God’s covenant people the victim.

But the last line of the prophecy takes a giant step out of the centuries of hate and rivalry and invective. Israel, so often a victim of Edomite aggression through the centuries, is suddenly revealed to be saved from the injustices of the past and taking up a position of rule over their ancient enemies the Edomites. But instead of doing to others what had been done to them and continuing the cycle of violence that they had been caught in, they are presented as taking over the reins of government and administering God’s justice justly. They find themselves in a new context—God’s kingdom—and realize that they have a new vocation—to represent God’s rule. It is not much (one verse out of twenty-one!), but it is a glimmer (it is the final verse!).

On the Day of Judgment, dark retaliation and invective do not get the last word. Only the first rays of the light of justice appear here. But these rays will eventually add up to a kingdom of light, in which all nations will be judged justly from the eternal throne in heaven.

Obadiah 1:2 - 5 (TMSG) 2“Listen to this, Edom: I’m turning you to a no-account, the runt of the godless nations, despised. 3You thought you were so great, perched high among the rocks, king of the mountain, Thinking to yourself, ‘Nobody can get to me! Nobody can touch me!’ 4 Think again. Even if, like an eagle, you hang out on a high cliff-face, Even if you build your nest in the stars, I’ll bring you down to earth.” God’s sure Word. 5“If thieves crept up on you, they’d rob you blind—isn’t that so? If they mugged you on the streets at night, they’d pick you clean—isn’t that so?

Obadiah 1:20 - 21 (TMSG) 20Earlier, Israelite exiles will come back and take Canaanite land to the north at Zarephath. Jerusalem exiles from the far northwest in Sepharad will come back and take the cities in the south. 21The remnant of the saved in Mount Zion will go into the mountains of Esau And rule justly and fairly, a rule that honors God’s kingdom.

WHAT WOULD CAUSE GOD TO ABANDON OR CONDEMN A WHOLE NATION?

Introduction to JONAH
Everybody knows about Jonah. People who have never read the Bible know enough about Jonah to laugh at a joke about him and the “whale.” Jonah has entered our folklore. There is a playful aspect to his story, a kind of slapstick clumsiness about Jonah as he bumbles his way along, trying, but always unsuccessfully, to avoid God. But the playfulness is not frivolous. This is deadly serious. While we are smiling or laughing at Jonah, we drop the guard with which we are trying to keep God at a comfortable distance, and suddenly we find ourselves caught in the purposes and commands of God. Stories are the most prominent biblical way of helping us see ourselves in “the God story,” which always gets around to the story of God making and saving us. Stories, in contrast to abstract statements of truth, tease us into becoming participants in what is being said. We find ourselves involved in the action. We may start out as spectators or critics, but if the story is good (and the biblical stories are very good!), we find ourselves no longer just listening to but inhabiting the story. One reason that the Jonah story is so enduringly important for nurturing the life of faith in us is that Jonah is not a hero too high and mighty for us to identify with—he doesn’t do anything great. Instead of being held up as an ideal to admire, we find Jonah as a companion in our ineptness. Here is someone on our level. Even when Jonah does it right (like preaching, finally, in Nineveh) he does it wrong (by getting angry at God). But the whole time, God is working within and around Jonah’s very ineptness and accomplishing his purposes in him. Most of us need a biblical friend or two like Jonah.

Jonah 1:1 - 3 (NRSV) 1Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai, saying, 2“Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before me.” 3But Jonah set out to flee to Tarshish from the presence of the LORD. He went down to Joppa and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid his fare and went on board, to go with them to Tarshish, away from the presence of the LORD.

Jonah 2:1 - 10 (NRSV) 1Then Jonah prayed to the LORD his God from the belly of the fish, 2saying, “I called to the LORD out of my distress, and he answered me; out of the belly of Sheol I cried, and you heard my voice. 3You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the flood surrounded me; all your waves and your billows passed over me. 4 Then I said, ‘I am driven away from your sight; how shall I look again upon your holy temple?’ 5The waters closed in over me; the deep surrounded me; weeds were wrapped around my head 6 at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the Pit, O LORD my God. 7As my life was ebbing away, I remembered the LORD; and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple. 8Those who worship vain idols forsake their true loyalty. 9But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you; what I have vowed I will pay. Deliverance belongs to the LORD!” 10Then the LORD spoke to the fish, and it spewed Jonah out upon the dry land.

Jonah 4:1 - 4 (NRSV) 1But this was very displeasing to Jonah, and he became angry. 2He prayed to the LORD and said, “O LORD! Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country? That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing. 3And now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.” 4And the LORD said, “Is it right for you to be angry?”

GOD WANTS JOEL TO SAVE HIS ENEMIES, THE OTHER, THE FOREIGNER. WHAT CHANGES HIS MIND? WHERE ARE YOU CHALLENGED TO HELP (SAVE) THOSE WHO HAVE HURT YOU?

Introduction to MICAH

Prophets use words to remake the world. The world—heaven and earth, men and women, animals and birds—was made in the first place by God’s Word. Prophets, arriving on the scene and finding that world in ruins, finding a world of moral rubble and spiritual disorder, take up the work of words again to rebuild what human disobedience and mistrust demolished. These prophets learn their speech from God. Their words are God-grounded, God-energized, God-passionate. As their words enter the language of our communities, men and women find themselves in the presence of God, who enters the mess of human sin to rebuke and renew.

Left to ourselves we turn God into an object, something we can deal with, something we can use to our benefit, whether that thing is a feeling or an idea or an image. Prophets scorn all such stuff. They train us to respond to God’s presence and voice.Micah, the final member of that powerful quartet of writing prophets who burst on the world scene in the eighth century b.c. (Isaiah, Hosea, and Amos were the others), like virtually all his fellow prophets—those charged with keeping people alive to God and alert to listening to the voice of God—was a master of metaphor. This means that he used words not simply to define or identify what can be seen, touched, smelled, heard, or tasted, but to plunge us into a world of presence. To experience presence is to enter that far larger world of reality that our sensory experiences point to but cannot describe—the realities of love and compassion, justice and faithfulness, sin and evil … and God. Mostly God. The realities that are Word-evoked are where most of the world’s action takes place. There are no “mere words.”

Micah 2:1 - 3 (TMSG) 1Doom to those who plot evil, who go to bed dreaming up crimes! As soon at it’s morning, they’re off, full of energy, doing what they’ve planned. 2They covet fields and grab them, find homes and take them. They bully the neighbor and his family, see people only for what they can get out of them. 3God has had enough. He says, “I have some plans of my own: Disaster because of this interbreeding evil! Your necks are on the line. You’re not walking away from this. It’s doomsday for you.

Micah 4:1 - 4 (NRSV) 1 In days to come the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and shall be raised up above the hills. Peoples shall stream to it, 2 and many nations shall come and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” For out of Zion shall go forth instruction, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. 3 He shall judge between many peoples, and shall arbitrate between strong nations far away; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore; 4 but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken.

Micah 3:9 - 11 (NRSV) 9 Hear this, you rulers of the house of Jacob and chiefs of the house of Israel, who abhor justice and pervert all equity, 10 who build Zion with blood and Jerusalem with wrong! 11 Its rulers give judgment for a bribe, its priests teach for a price, its prophets give oracles for money; yet they lean upon the LORD and say, “Surely the LORD is with us! No harm shall come upon us.”

Micah 6:6 - 8 (NRSV) 6 “With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? 7 Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” 8 He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

WHAT DOES GOD REQUIRE OF YOU?

Introduction to NAHUM

The stage of history is large. Larger-than-life figures appear on this stage from time to time, swaggering about, brandishing weapons and money, terrorizing and bullying. These figures are not, as they suppose themselves to be, at the center of the stage—not, in fact, anywhere near the center. But they make a lot of noise and are able to call attention to themselves. They often manage to get a significant number of people watching and even admiring: big nations, huge armies, important people. At any given moment a few superpower nations and their rulers dominate the daily news. Every century a few of these names are left carved on its park benches, marking rather futile, and in retrospect pitiable, attempts at immortality. The danger is that the noise of these pretenders to power will distract us from what is going on quietly at the center of the stage in the person and action of God. God’s characteristic way of working is in quietness and through prayer. “I speak,” says poet George Meredith, “of the unremarked forces that split the heart and make the pavement toss—forces concealed in quiet people and plants.” If we are conditioned to respond to noise and size, we will miss God’s word and action.

From time to time, God assigns someone to pay attention to one or another of these persons or nations or movements just long enough to get the rest of us to quit paying so much attention to them and get back to the main action: God! Nahum drew that assignment in the seventh century b.c. Assyria had the whole world terrorized. At the time that Nahum delivered his prophecy, Assyria (and its capital, Nineveh) appeared invincible. A world free of Assyrian domination was unimaginable. Nahum’s task was to make it imaginable—to free God’s people from Assyrian paralysis, free them to believe in and pray to a sovereign God. Nahum’s preaching, his Spirit-born metaphors, his God-shaped syntax, knocked Assyria off her high horse and cleared the field of Nineveh-distraction so that Israel could see that despite her world reputation, Assyria didn’t amount to much. Israel could now attend to what was really going on.

Because Nahum has a single message—doom to Nineveh/Assyria—it is easy to misunderstand the prophet as simply a Nineveh-hater. But Nahum writes and preaches out of the large context in which Israel’s sins are denounced as vigorously as those of any of her enemies. The effect of Nahum is not to foment religious hate against the enemy but to say, “Don’t admire or be intimidated by this enemy. They are going to be judged by the very same standards applied to us.”

Nahum 1:1 - 4 (NRSV) 1An oracle concerning Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum of Elkosh. 2 A jealous and avenging God is the LORD, the LORD is avenging and wrathful; the LORD takes vengeance on his adversaries and rages against his enemies. 3 The LORD is slow to anger but great in power and the LORD will by no means clear the guilty. His way is in whirlwind and storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet. 4 He rebukes the sea and makes it dry, and he dries up all the rivers; Bashan and Carmel wither, and the bloom of Lebanon fades.

Nahum 1:12 - 15 (NRSV) 12 Thus says the LORD, “Though they are at full strength and many, they will be cut off and pass away. Though I have afflicted you, I will afflict you no more. 13And now I will break off his yoke from you and snap the bonds that bind you.” 14 The LORD has commanded concerning you: “Your name shall be perpetuated no longer; from the house of your gods I will cut off the carved image and the cast image. I will make your grave, for you are worthless.” 15 Look! On the mountains the feet of one who brings good tidings, who proclaims peace! Celebrate your festivals, O Judah, fulfill your vows, for never again shall the wicked invade you; they are utterly cut off.

GOD IS DESCRIBED AS JEALOUS AND VENGEFUL AS WELL AS SLOW TO ANGER…WHICH IS IT…CAN GOD HAVE IT BOTH WAYS?

Introduction to Habakkuk

Living by faith is a bewildering venture. We rarely know what’s coming next, and not many things turn out the way we anticipate. It is natural to assume that since I am God’s chosen and beloved, I will get favorable treatment from the God who favors me so extravagantly. It is not unreasonable to expect that from the time that I become his follower, I will be exempt from dead ends, muddy detours, and cruel treatment from the travelers I meet daily who are walking the other direction. That God-followers don’t get preferential treatment in life always comes as a surprise. But it’s also a surprise to find that there are a few men and women within the Bible who show up alongside us at such moments. The prophet Habakkuk is one of them, and a most welcome companion he is. Most prophets, most of the time, speak God’s Word to us. They are preachers calling us to listen to God’s words of judgment and salvation, confrontation and comfort. They face us with God as he is, not as we imagine him to be. Habakkuk speaks our word to God. He gives voice to our bewilderment, articulates our puzzled attempts to make sense of things, faces God with our disappointment with God. He insists that God pay attention to us, and he insists with a prophet’s characteristic no-nonsense bluntness. The circum-stance that aroused Habakkuk took place in the seventh century b.c. The prophet realized that God was going to use the godless military machine of Babylon to bring God’s judgment on God’s own people! It didn’t make sense, and Habakkuk was quick and bold to say so. He dared to voice his feelings that God didn’t know his own God business: “God, you don’t seem to make sense!” But this prophet companion who stands at our side does something even more important: He waits and he listens. It is in his waiting and listening—which then turns into his praying—that he found himself inhabiting the large world of God’s sovereignty. Only there did he eventually realize that the believing-in-God life, the steady trusting-in-God life, is the full life, the only real life. Habakkuk started out exactly where we start out with our puzzled complaints and God-accusations, but he didn’t stay there. He ended up in a world, along with us, where every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

Habakkuk 1:2 - 5 (NRSV) 2O LORD, how long shall I cry for help and you will not listen? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save? 3 Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. 4 So the law becomes slack and justice never prevails. The wicked surround the righteous— therefore judgment comes forth perverted. 5 Look at the nations, and see! Be astonished! Be astounded! For a work is being done in your days that you would not believe if you were told.

Habakkuk 2:4 - 5 (TMSG) 4“Look at that man, bloated by self-importance— full of himself but soul-empty. But the person in right standing before God through loyal and steady believing is fully alive, really alive. 5“Note well: Money deceives. The arrogant rich don’t last. They are more hungry for wealth than the grave is for cadavers. Like death, they always want more, but the ‘more’ they get is dead bodies. They are cemeteries filled with dead nations, graveyards filled with corpses.

Habakkuk 3:17 - 19 (NRSV) 17 Though the fig tree does not blossom, and no fruit is on the vines; though the produce of the olive fails, and the fields yield no food; though the flock is cut off from the fold, and there is no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will exult in the God of my salvation. 19 GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the feet of a deer, and makes me tread upon the heights. To the leader: with stringed instruments.

HOW OR WHERE WOULD YOU SEE THESE WORDS APPLYING TO YOUR SELF, YOUR CHURCH, YOUR NATION, YOUR WORLD?

Introduction To Zephaniah

We humans keep looking for a religion that will give us access to God without having to bother with people. We want to go to God for comfort and inspiration when we’re fed up with the men and women and children around us. We want God to give us an edge in the dog-eat-dog competition of daily life. This determination to get ourselves a religion that gives us an inside track with God but leaves us free to deal with people however we like is age-old. It is the sort of religion that has been promoted and marketed with both zeal and skill throughout human history. Business is always booming. It is also the sort of religion that the biblical prophets are determined to root out. They are dead set against it. Because the root of the solid spiritual life is embedded in a relationship between people and God, it is easy to develop the misunderstanding that my spiritual life is something personal between God and me—a private thing to be nurtured by prayers and singing, spiritual readings that comfort and inspire, and worship with like-minded friends. If we think this way for very long, we will assume that the way we treat the people we don’t like or who don’t like us has nothing to do with God.

That’s when the prophets step in and interrupt us, insisting, “Everything you do or think or feel has to do with God. Every person you meet has to do with God.” We live in a vast world of interconnectedness, and the connections have consequences, either in things or in people—and all the consequences come together in God. The biblical phrase for the coming together of the consequences is Judgment Day. We can’t be reminded too often or too forcefully of this reckoning. Zephaniah’s voice in the choir of prophets sustains the intensity, the urgency.

Zephaniah 1:1 - 3 (NRSV) 1The word of the LORD that came to Zephaniah son of Cushi son of Gedaliah son of Amariah son of Hezekiah, in the days of King Josiah son of Amon of Judah. 2 I will utterly sweep away everything from the face of the earth, says the LORD. 3 I will sweep away humans and animals; I will sweep away the birds of the air and the fish of the sea. I will make the wicked stumble. I will cut off humanity from the face of the earth, says the LORD.

Zephaniah 3:1 - 6 (NRSV) 1 Ah, soiled, defiled, oppressing city! 2 It has listened to no voice; it has accepted no correction. It has not trusted in the LORD; it has not drawn near to its God. 3 The officials within it are roaring lions; its judges are evening wolves that leave nothing until the morning. 4 Its prophets are reckless, faithless persons; its priests have profaned what is sacred, they have done violence to the law. 5 The LORD within it is righteous; he does no wrong. Every morning he renders his judgment, each dawn without fail; but the unjust knows no shame. 6I have cut off nations; their battlements are in ruins; I have laid waste their streets so that no one walks in them; their cities have been made desolate, without people, without inhabitants.

Zephaniah 3:17 - 20 (NRSV) 17 The LORD, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing 18 as on a day of festival. I will remove disaster from you, so that you will not bear reproach for it. 19 I will deal with all your oppressors at that time. And I will save the lame and gather the outcast, and I will change their shame into praise and renown in all the earth. 20 At that time I will bring you home, at the time when I gather you; for I will make you renowned and praised among all the peoples of the earth, when I restore your fortunes before your eyes, says the LORD.

EUGENE PETERSON TALKS ABOUT INTERCONNECTEDNESS AND CONSEQUENCES IN OUR WORLD. WHAT DOES ZEPHANIAH ADD TO OUR UNDERSTANDING OF GOD’S EXPECTATIONS OF OUR BEHAVIOR AS INDIVIDUALS AND AS A CHURCH?

Introduction to Haggai

Places of worship are a problem. And the problem does not seem to be architectural. Grand Gothic cathedrals that dominate a city don’t ensure that the worship of God dominates that city. Unpainted, ramshackle, clapboard sheds perched precariously on the edge of a prairie don’t guarantee a congregation of humble saints in denim. As we look over the centuries of the many and various building projects in God’s name—wilderness tabernacle, revival tent, Gothic cathedral, wayside chapel, synagogue, temple, meetinghouse, storefront mission, the catacombs—there doesn’t seem to be any connection between the buildings themselves and the belief and behavior of the people who assemble in them. In noticing this, it is not uncommon for us to be dismissive of the buildings themselves by saying, “A place of worship is not a building; it’s people,” or, “I prefer worshiping God in the great cathedral of the outdoors.” These pronouncements are often tagged with the scriptural punch line, “The God who made the universe doesn’t live in custom-made shrines,” which is supposed to end the discussion. God doesn’t live in buildings—period. That’s what we often say. But then there is Haggai to account for. Haggai was dignified with the title “prophet” (therefore we must take him seriously). His single task, carried out in a three-and-a-half-month mission, was to get God’s people to work at rebuilding God’s Temple (the same Temple that had been destroyed by God’s decree only seventy or so years earlier). Compared with the great prophets who preached repentance and salvation, Haggai’s message doesn’t sound very “spiritual.” But in God’s economy it is perhaps unwise to rank our assigned work as either more or less spiritual. We are not angels; we inhabit space. Material—bricks and mortar, boards and nails—keeps us grounded and connected with the ordinary world in which we necessarily live out our extraordinary beliefs. Haggai keeps us in touch with those times in our lives when repairing the building where we worship is an act of obedience every bit as important as praying in that place of worship.

Haggai 1:1 - 4 (TMSG) 1On the first day of the sixth month of the second year in the reign of King Darius of Persia, God’s Message was delivered by the prophet Haggai to the governor of Judah, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and to the high priest, Joshua son of Jehozadak: 2A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies: “The people procrastinate. They say this isn’t the right time to rebuild my Temple, the Temple of God.” 3Shortly after that, God said more and Haggai spoke it: 4“How is it that it’s the ‘right time’ for you to live in your fine new homes while the Home, God’s Temple, is in ruins?”

Haggai 1:9 - 11 (TMSG) 9You’ve had great ambitions for yourselves, but nothing has come of it. The little you have brought to my Temple I’ve blown away—there was nothing to it. “And why?” (This is a Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, remember.) “Because while you’ve run around, caught up with taking care of your own houses, my Home is in ruins. 10That’s why. Because of your stinginess. And so I’ve given you a dry summer and a skimpy crop. 11I’ve matched your tight-fisted stinginess by decreeing a season of drought, drying up fields and hills, withering gardens and orchards, stunting vegetables and fruit. Nothing—not man or woman, not animal or crop—is going to thrive.”

Haggai 2:4 - 9 (TMSG) 4“‘So get to work, Zerubbabel!’—God is speaking. “‘Get to work, Joshua son of Jehozadak—high priest!’ “‘Get to work, all you people!’—God is speaking. “‘Yes, get to work! For I am with you.’ The God-of-the-Angel-Armies is speaking! 5‘Put into action the word I covenanted with you when you left Egypt. I’m living and breathing among you right now. Don’t be timid. Don’t hold back.’ 6“This is what God-of-the-Angel-Armies said: ‘Before you know it, I will shake up sky and earth, ocean and fields. 7And I’ll shake down all the godless nations. They’ll bring bushels of wealth and I will fill this Temple with splendor.’ God-of-the-Angel-Armies says so. 8‘I own the silver, I own the gold.’ says the God-of-the-Angel-Armies. 9“‘This Temple is going to end up far better than it started out, a glorious beginning but an even more glorious finish: a place in which I will hand out wholeness and holiness.’

WHAT DOES THIS SAY ABOUT STEWARDSHIP OF GOD’S HOME? IS THE CHURCH BUILDING A SACRED SPACE? HOW MUCH PRIORITY SHOULD WE PLACE ON OUR SANCTUARIES?

Introduction to Zechariah

Zechariah shared with his contemporary Haggai the prophetic task of getting the people of Judah to rebuild their ruined Temple. Their preaching pulled the people out of self-preoccupation and got them working together as a people of God. There was a job to do, and the two prophets teamed up to make sure it got done.

But Zechariah did more than that. For the people were faced with more than a ruined Temple and city. Their self-identity as the people of God was in ruins. For a century they had been knocked around by the world powers, kicked and mocked, used and abused. This once-proud people, their glorious sacred history starred with the names of Abraham, Moses, Samuel, David, and Isaiah, had been treated with contempt for so long that they were in danger of losing all connection with that past, losing their magnificent identity as God’s people. Zechariah was a major factor in recovering the magnificence from the ruins of a degrading exile. Zechariah reinvigorated their imaginations with his visions and messages. The visions provided images of a sovereign God that worked their way into the lives of the people, countering the long ordeal of debasement and ridicule. The messages forged a fresh vocabulary that gave energy and credibility to the long-term purposes of God being worked out in their lives. But that isn’t the end of it. Zechariah’s enigmatic visions, working at multiple levels, and his poetically charged messages are at work still, like time capsules in the lives of God’s people, continuing to release insight and hope and clarity for the people whom God is using to work out his purposes in a world that has no language for God and the purposes of God.

Zechariah 1:1 - 6 (NRSV) 1In the eighth month, in the second year of Darius, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Zechariah son of Berechiah son of Iddo, saying: 2The LORD was very angry with your ancestors. 3Therefore say to them, Thus says the LORD of hosts: Return to me, says the LORD of hosts, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. 4Do not be like your ancestors, to whom the former prophets proclaimed, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, Return from your evil ways and from your evil deeds.” But they did not hear or heed me, says the LORD. 5Your ancestors, where are they? And the prophets, do they live forever? 6But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not overtake your ancestors? So they repented and said, “The LORD of hosts has dealt with us according to our ways and deeds, just as he planned to do.”

Zechariah 7:8 - 12 (NRSV) 8The word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying: 9Thus says the LORD of hosts: Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another; 10do not oppress the widow, the orphan, the alien, or the poor; and do not devise evil in your hearts against one another. 11But they refused to listen, and turned a stubborn shoulder, and stopped their ears in order not to hear. 12They made their hearts adamant in order not to hear the law and the words that the LORD of hosts had sent by his spirit through the former prophets. Therefore great wrath came from the LORD of hosts.

Zechariah 9:9 - 10 (NRSV) 9 Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem! Lo, your king comes to you; triumphant and victorious is he, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. 10 He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war-horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall command peace to the nations; his dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.

WHAT ARE THE ESSENTIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE IDENTITY OF A PERSON OF FAITH OR FOR A CHURCH?

Introduction to Malachi

Most of life is not lived in crisis—which is a good thing. Not many of us would be able to sustain a life of perpetual pain or loss or ecstasy or challenge. But crisis has this to say for it: In time of crisis everything, absolutely everything, is important and significant. Life itself is on the line. No word is casual, no action marginal. And almost always, God and our relationship with God is on the front page. But during the humdrum times, when things are, as we tend to say, “normal,” our interest in God is crowded to the margins of our lives and we become preoccupied with ourselves. “Religion” during such times is trivialized into asking “God-questions”—calling God into question or complaining about him, treating the worship of God as a mere hobby or diversion, managing our personal affairs (such as marriage) for our own convenience and disregarding what God has to say about them, going about our usual activities as if God were not involved in such dailiness. The prophecy of Malachi is made to order for just such conditions. Malachi creates a crisis at a time when we are unaware of crisis. He wakes us up to the crisis of God during the times when the only thing we are concerned with is us. He keeps us on our toes, listening for God, waiting in anticipation for God, ready to respond to God, who is always coming to us. Malachi gets in the last word of Holy Scripture in the Old Testament. The final sentences in his message to us evoke the gigantic figures of Moses and Elijah—Moses to keep us rooted in what God has done and said in the past, Elijah to keep us alert to what God will do in the days ahead. By leaving us in the company of mighty Moses and fiery Elijah, Malachi considerably reduces the danger of our trivializing matters of God and the soul.

Malachi 1:6 - 8 (TMSG) 6“Isn’t it true that a son honors his father and a worker his master? So if I’m your Father, where’s the honor? If I’m your Master, where’s the respect?” God-of-the-Angel-Armies is calling you on the carpet: “You priests despise me! “You say, ‘Not so! How do we despise you?’ “By your shoddy, sloppy, defiling worship. “You ask, ‘What do you mean, “defiling”? What’s defiling about it?’ 7“When you say, ‘The altar of God is not important anymore; worship of God is no longer a priority,’ that’s defiling. 8And when you offer worthless animals for sacrifices in worship, animals that you’re trying to get rid of—blind and sick and crippled animals—isn’t that defiling?

Malachi 2:5 - 8 (TMSG) 5My covenant with Levi was to give life and peace. I kept my covenant with him, and he honored me. He stood in reverent awe before me. 6He taught the truth and did not lie. He walked with me in peace and uprightness. He kept many out of the ditch, kept them on the road. 7“It’s the job of priests to teach the truth. People are supposed to look to them for guidance. The priest is the messenger of God-of-the-Angel-Armies. 8But you priests have abandoned the way of priests. Your teaching has messed up many lives. You have corrupted the covenant of priest Levi. God-of-the-Angel-Armies says so.

Malachi 3:1 - 5 (NRSV) 1See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight—indeed, he is coming, says the LORD of hosts. 2But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap; 3he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, until they present offerings to the LORD in righteousness. 4Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the LORD as in the days of old and as in former years. 5Then I will draw near to you for judgment; I will be swift to bear witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired workers in their wages, the widow and the orphan, against those who thrust aside the alien, and do not fear me, says the LORD of hosts.

HOW COULD WE REFINE OR PURIFY OUR WORSHIP AND OUR LIVES?