Zephaniah 1:2-6

Zephaniah’s  message carried the good news/bad news scenario. The Bad News was the day of judgement was coming but the Good News carried a glimmer of hope for man he must repent and turn back to God. There is one, and only one, way to eternal life the way of the Cross. Man is incapable of living without sin. Only in and through the blood of the Lamb of God, slain for our sins, can man live.

The message of Zephaniah begins with a pronouncement of universal judgment. These words not only introduce the particular judgment that would be pronounced upon Judah, but they also speak of the final judgment that will usher in the kingdom of God on earth (Revelation 19).

Baal worship and its evils had led to the destruction of Israel and its capital Samaria in 722 b.c. Likewise, Baal worship and its associations would lead to the destruction of Judah and its capital Jerusalem in 586 b.c. Milcom is a reference to an Ammonite deity whose worship included acts of infant sacrifice,

Zephaniah 1:2-6

² “I will utterly consume everything

From the face of the land,”

Says the Lord;

³ “I will consume man and beast;

I will consume the birds of the heavens,

The fish of the sea,

And the stumbling blocks along with the wicked.

I will cut off man from the face of the land,”

Says the Lord.

⁴ “I will stretch out My hand against Judah,

And against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

I will cut off every trace of Baal from this place,

The names of the idolatrous priests with the pagan priests—

⁵ Those who worship the host of heaven on the housetops;

Those who worship and swear oaths by the Lord,

But who also swear by Milcom;

⁶ Those who have turned back from following the Lord,

And have not sought the Lord, nor inquired of Him.”

¹³ “I will surely consume them,” says the Lord. “No grapes shall be on the vine, Nor figs on the fig tree, And the leaf shall fade; And the things I have given them shall pass away from them.” ’ ” 

Jeremiah 8:13

³ Therefore the land will mourn; And everyone who dwells there will waste away With the beasts of the field And the birds of the air; Even the fish of the sea will be taken away. 

Hosea 4:3

⁴ Alas, sinful nation, A people laden with iniquity, A brood of evildoers, Children who are corrupters! They have forsaken the Lord, They have provoked to anger The Holy One of Israel, They have turned away backward. 

Isaiah 1:4