Reading Zephaniah

Zephaniah is another prophet sent to announce God's coming judgement. This time its for the nation of Judah. Mainly, Zephaniah focuses the coming day of the Lord. He assures the people that God will punish everyone, including them if they don't correct their ways. The book also contains God's message to the surrounding nations, messages of judgement again. His mercy will prevail if the people turn to Him.

Again, this message applies to us today. We need to heed this warning, and obey the Lord. If we don't judgement awaits us, just like it does to everyone else in this world. It's also important that we spread this message as much as possible. This possible ending for the world should make us strive to spread the news to everyone that we can.

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Reading Habakkuk

Habakkuk is another interesting prophetic book, with some unique ties to external sources. Unlike the other prophetic books, Habakkuk is formatted in a dialogue, instead of an oracle. The book records this talk between Habakkuk and God with both parties actively participating.

Much like many other Old Testament characters, especially the prophets, the book starts with Habakkuk complaining to God. The connection can be drawn vividly to Jonah, and his similar complaint to God, regarding His unjust ways.

However ultimately, God responds, and confirms that He is indeed just. He assures Habakkuk that the destroyer will be destroyed. Habakkuk responds to this in faith, and recommits himself to his Lord. A patient wait is accepted by the prophet, and accepted wholeheartedly.

This should pan over in our lives today. We are surrounded by immoral characters all over, that seem to be receiving blessings instead of punishment. As Habakkuk learns, that shouldn't frustrate us. Instead we should take confidence in our Lord, and look forward to the end times.

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Reading Nahum

Nahum serves as a sequel or follow up to the story contained in Jonah. While many don't realize it, it is really part two of the plot that concerns Nineveh. Jonah left the story off at a good point; Nineveh had listened to the message of repentance, and had seemed to readily accept the concept into their hearts and minds. However, Nahum reveals that this hopeful state only lasted for a short while. The Assyrian capital city fell back into sin, returning to their ways of picking on surrounding countries, continually terrorizing those they had conquered. Nahum serves to remind the Israelites that while God does have great mercy, He also has a just side, and there is a balance between the two.

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Ultimately, God wants to display His mercy as often as possible. But when people, such as the Nineveh citizens, spurn this message and continue sinning, God is also just, and His judgement will come. Nahum serves to remind the Israelites of this, and to urge them to be patient, and wait for God's judgement, rather then act out themselves without God's blessing.

This does bring up an interesting discussion regarding the issue of believers who fall away from their faith, and their ultimate destination; heaven or hell. There are many contributing Biblical verses to the discussion, all regarding if believers can lose their salvation. While this book is not entirely clear on the ultimate end of God's judgement, it still does provide another side to the debate.

Reading Micah

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The book of Micah is one that is directed to a specific population of the Israel society. Rather then focus on the whole culture, he chooses to direct his prophecy directly at the powerful leaders of the time. Ultimately, this serves his purpose of concern for those who are in poverty, or in need. While we do know that obviously this was God inspired, it's possible that God specifically chose Micah as the prophet for this message because of his location and family history. Micah came from a poor family background in an agricultural village far from the powerful capital cities. At times, he uses his personal experience to vividly express his message. He predicts the upcoming doom, because of the leader's evil thoughts and actions.

However, like many of the other prophetic books, it isn't all doom and gloom. Micah also provides hope with his prophecy regarding the birth of Jesus Christ. He points to Jesus' eternal nature, and his birthplace. Micah also alludes to the future kingdom of Christ, where peace will reign. Here again is where the contrasting picture of Israel and Judah's current state and the world's future is displayed.

The book serves as a warning and hope for us today. The warning is what happens if we fall away from God, while the hope is seen in what God will provide for those who don't fall away or ignore Him. Even though many of the prophecies of this book have been fulfilled, there are others which we can look to see in the future. God works in wondrous ways, and we will never fully comprehend, especially these prophecies, until the end times.

Reading Jonah

Perhaps this is the most discussed book of the prophetic section of the Old Testament. The discussion centres around the historicity of the content of the book. Many seem to interpret the story as exactly that, just a story. It contains many of the same elements of Jesus' parables, and therefore many people simply believe it is a story with multiple hidden meanings. Others hold to the belief that this is the actual account of the prophet Jonah son of Ammitai.

It's hard to find proof for either interpretation, but either provides some important lessons for Christians. Like much of the rest of the Bible, while it is interesting to discuss the different options, I believe it is preferable to focus on what can be learned and applied to our lives. What is practical from the book?

The parable interpretation points to a prophecy concerning Christ. Ultimately, the story is presenting Jonah as a Christological character. His story points to Jesus, with the death symbolized in the belly of a whale, and resurrection coming while being spit up by the whale.

This tends to be what most people focus on, but there are other lessons in the story, that both the parable and historical interpretations should pick up on. The message of ignoring God is one that jumps out right away. We all read the story and laugh at Jonah's stupidity thinking he could hide from God, but how many times do we try to hide from God, or hide our actions or thoughts? We tend to forget that God is all knowing and all powerful, and that impacts every aspect of our lives.

Another lesson is that ultimately God's plan overrules ours. We can see this twice in Jonah's story. First comes when Jonah tries to run from God. Ultimately, he ends up right where God wants him. Second is regarding the story of Nineveh. Here, Jonah plans to watch the city burn into the ground, but ultimately God's plan of forgiveness wins out, no matter the griping of Jonah.

Perhaps the most important message of the book is regarding God's forgiveness. It is a multi-faceted message; one that is extremely hard to nail down, or describe correctly. We can see that God's forgiveness is for anyone, no matter what state of sin they are in, or where they come from, or how long it takes. As long as the heart condition is right, the response is there, and the people are eager, then God is ready to forgive. 

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Reading Obadiah

Obadiah, although being the shortest book of the Bible, is perhaps one of the most precious. Each word is loaded with meaning, carefully selected by this mystery author by the name of Obadiah. The importance and purpose behind each word of the book cannot be missed which leads to a concise, but information filled reading.

The book focuses on the foreign nation of Edom, making Obadiah one of three prophets to direct their messages mainly to a different nation than Israel. Edom was a nation full of people who were very vain. They thought of themselves as amazing people, definitely better than God's people. Because of this, they ended up stealing from, mocking, and harming the Israelites. Obadiah used the Edomites to provide a message warning against pride, and against wrongful treatment of God's people. Ultimately, the message ends with a reminder of God's sovereign power over the whole earth, not just His chosen people.

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Reading Amos

Amos is a very interesting character, a unique prophet. He continually claims that he was never trained as a prophet, and relies upon his meager backstory as a sheep herder and sycamore fig farmer to back his title as a true prophet. Interestingly, almost all of the prophets who have a book in the Old Testament were untrained in the school of prophecy. They all rely upon their interesting starts to back their claims as God's true prophets. It goes to show that God can call anyone to do anything.

Amos really focuses on the main topic of rituals. At the heart of his prophecy is the issue of the condition of the people's hearts. His argument was two faceted, but ultimately they spearhead his mission to get people to start working on their hearts, and to start purifying their souls.

The first part of Amos' prophecy focuses on forgiveness, or how to react from bad deeds or actions. The people of this time were just relying upon quick rituals, or meaningless prayers as their follow up to a sinful action. Ultimately, they weren't repenting, and would just continue in this cycle of sinning, and quickly praying for forgiveness with no meaning. This showed the horrible nature of the hearts of the people at this time.

Secondly, Amos points out that following rituals means nothing compared to living righteously. Again, it speaks to this first issue. God would rather we attempt to live righteously, mess up once in a while, and actually strive for forgiveness. Repentance is three fold. It's realizing you made a mistake, asking for forgiveness, and then striving to make a change in your life. Rituals don't matter if they are continual. If they are occasional, filled with meaning, and truly dedicated to God, then they fulfill the original intention that they were created for.

Again, it comes down to our hearts. If our hearts are set on the world, then we won't strive to live righteously, even if we claim to be Christians. But if our hearts are set on God, then it will show in our lives, as we strive to be more Christ-like.

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