Life in God’s Kingdom Is Not What We Expect!

4th Sunday after Epiphany, 1/29/23 Zephaniah 2:3; 3:11-13 Life in God’s Kingdom Is Not What We Expect! I. Only the humble survive. II. Only the humble thrive. Every day of life here on this earth is a learning experience. Some call it the school of hard knocks. We observe what others are doing in order to be successful at making it in this world and we adopt or modify their strategies for our own lives. We’re trying to make a difference. We’re trying to be somebody. We want others to admire what we’ve accomplished. We want to be known for something. But, that often means we’re going to have to ignore others while we pursue our goals. We’re going to have to keep our focus on our lives and refrain from getting sidetracked into the lives of others. We’re going to have to do what’s best for me and make no apologies for it. And we support that outlook on life by reminding ourselves, “If I don’t look out for myself, no one else will.” But, then along comes Jesus, and in his famous Sermon on the Mount we heard him state just minutes ago, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth (Mt. 5:5). That flies in the face of everything our world believes and practices about how to live your life. And he opened that sermon with these words, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Mt. 5:3). The poor in spirit are those who know they have nothing to offer that would make them worthy. As surprising as Jesus’ words were when he spoke them on that mountain, it wasn’t the first time that he spoke that way. He did so through the prophet Zephaniah more than 600 years earlier. Zephaniah’s words to us this morning echo the words that Jesus spoke in his Sermon on the Mount. And what he wants us to understand is that life in God’s kingdom is not what we expect. It’s radically different from what we see and hear from our world. We know that, but we can use the reminder. So, let’s pay attention to this portion of God’s word this morning. Part I. In order to understand why Zephaniah speaks as he does, you need to know his background. Zephaniah was a prophet of the Lord in Judah during the reign of the godly King Josiah. While we don’t know the exact dates of his ministry, a good guess would be about 620 BC. During this time, Josiah was successful at making religious reforms in Judah. The Lord blessed his efforts at ridding the land of idolatry and in re-establishing the worship of the Lord in the Temple. He was devoted to the Lord his entire reign. Unfortunately, the people he ruled didn’t share his devotion to the Lord. Josiah was able to make reforms at the top, but they didn’t take root in the hearts of the people. And so, the Lord sent Zephaniah to them with this basic message, “Judgment is coming.” More than a century before Zephaniah lived the Lord foretold that the he would use the Babylonians to bring his judgment upon the people of Judah, and that judgment was a little more than a decade away. In 605 BC the Babylonians attacked and defeated Judah, and then again in 597 BC, and once more in 586 BC when they destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple. Judgment was coming! In a unique way, Zephaniah combined that message of judgment with another one—the judgment on the Last Day. The Lord was not just concerned about the small number of people living in the country of Judah during Josiah’s reign; he was concerned about all people of all time and he wants all people to be ready to face his judgment. And here’s how to be prepared, “Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, you who do what he commands. Seek righteousness, seek humility; perhaps you will be sheltered on the day of the LORD’s anger.” Zephaniah uses an interesting word for “humble” in these verses. It can also mean “oppressed” which is an oppression coming from other people. The Lord wants his people to turn to him in repentance and humility which means that they won’t engage in the sinful ways of the people around them. And that will cause the people around them to take advantage of them. Sounds pretty hopeless, doesn’t it? But the Lord has good news. He told these same humble people to seek righteousness. That’s not a righteousness they produce on their own. It’s not a righteousness that they earn by their own good deeds. It’s a righteousness that comes from outside them. It’s a righteousness that comes from God and becomes their own righteousness by faith in the God of their salvation. So, while they might be suffering persecution for their humble ways, they have the assurance that they are righteous or holy before their God. In fact, God promises that he will shelter them. We know that the Lord spared several thousand Jews from death at the hands of the Babylonians, godly men such as Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. He kept for himself a remnant of the Jews so that he would use them centuries later to bring the Savior into the world. And we also have the Lord’s promise that he will shelter the humble in the judgment on the Last Day. He will say, “Come, inherit the kingdom prepared for you,” to all who trust in Jesus as their Savior. Bottom line, as devasting as the destruction of Jerusalem was and as horrific as the judgment on the Last Day will be, it’s not the mighty, the proud, and the successful who will survive. It’s the humble. Life in God’s kingdom is not what we expect. Only the humble survive. What’s the secret to success in life? There are countless books on that subject. But only what’s written in one book matters, and that’s the one we have before us. It’s Christian humility. That humility realizes we are nothing before our God on our own but sinners who deserve his punishment. That humility realizes that God himself made us worthy to live with him by the work that our Savior did for us. He humbled himself to death on a cross in our place. His resurrection guarantees our blessed relationship with the holy God. That relationship exists even though we violate our God’s holy will every day. That’s because we live in his forgiveness by faith in Jesus. Those are the truths that lead to success in life, real life, life with God. So, what’s standing in the way of you living in that humility? Is it the lure of what this world offers? Is it that innate drive to achieve success and recognition in this world? Is it a time issue—you simply are too busy to consider what it means to live humbly before your God? Whatever it is, there’s another reason to lay it our humbly before your Lord, to receive his forgiveness and, in the power of that forgiveness, to live humbly before your God, because only the humble survive. Part II. But if we do that—if we live humbly and survive—won’t we lose out on some of the blessings God has in store for us? If we’re willing to be oppressed by our world because of our humility, how will we be able to reach our God-given potential? Will we get left behind? Our God answers those concerns in these words of our text, “On that day you, Jerusalem, will not be put to shame for all the wrongs you have done to me, because I will remove from you your arrogant boasters. Never again will you be haughty on my holy hill. But I will leave within you the meek and humble.” Did you understand what the Lord just stated? Perhaps not. Let’s unpack it. First, he will remove the prideful. Notice that the Lord doesn’t say when he will do this. That’s because it’s an on-going process throughout history. The Lord calls to account those who want nothing to do with him—those who are filled with pride—every time he calls one out of this world and has them stand in judgment before him. Ultimately, he will do that on Judgment Day. And as he does so, the humble thrive. And then he establishes this special, spiritual body of all his believers which is called the Church. Only Christians are in that body of people and all of them have been sanctified or made holy by the Holy Spirit. And you are a member of that kingdom, a kingdom in which the humble thrive. Finally, the Lord has this in store for the humble, “The remnant of Israel will trust in the name of the LORD. They will do no wrong; they will tell no lies. A deceitful tongue will not be found in their mouths. They will eat and lie down and no one will make them afraid.” Spiritually speaking, God gives that rest and peace and joy to the humble right now as they live in his kingdom. But ultimately the humble will thrive in that rest and peace and joy in the eternal bliss that Jesus has prepared for them in heaven. And after the resurrection on the Last Day, our bodies will live in that rest and peace and joy eternally. Life in God’s kingdom is not what we expect. Only the humble thrive. Only the humble thrive. Do you fell like you’re thriving? Probably not. Most of the time we’re just hoping to make it over the next hurdle in life. And we tend to view our lives in terms of what we don’t have, rather than what we have. God’s word to us this morning turns that view around. Remember that life in God’s kingdom is not what we expect. The humble are not just getting by; they’re thriving! They’re thriving because they have every blessing Jesus won for them right now including the gifts of forgiveness and eternal life. That’s right—heaven is already yours. Jesus has given it to you. I know the world scoffs at life in God’s kingdom as worthless and non-existent. But by God’s grace, we know better. Your God calls you to live humbly in his kingdom. Only the humble survive. And only the humble thrive. God promises it to you. And he is faithful to all his promises. Amen.