15 That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and sorrow, a day of wasting and destruction, a day of dark night and deep shade, a day of cloud and thick dark.
For a day of dark and deep shade is near, a day of cloud and black night: like a black cloud a great and strong people is covering the mountains; there has never been any like them and will not be after them again, from generation to generation.
For it is a day of trouble and of crushing down and of destruction from the Lord, the Lord of armies, in the valley of vision; ...
Sorrow to you who are looking for the day of the Lord! what is the day of the Lord to you? it is dark and not light. As if a man, running away from a lion, came face to face with a bear; or went into the house and put his hand on the wall and got a bite from a snake. Will not the day of the Lord be dark and not light? even very dark, with no light shining in it?
That day--let it be dark; let not God take note of it from on high, and let not the light be shining on it; Let the dark and the black night take it for themselves; let it be covered with a cloud; let the dark shades of day send fear on it. That night--let the thick dark take it; let it not have joy among the days of the year; let it not come into the number of the months. As for that night, let it have no fruit; let no voice of joy be sounded in it; Let it be cursed by those who put a curse on the day; who are ready to make Leviathan awake.
Ha! for that day is so great that there is no day like it: it is the time of Jacob's trouble: but he will get salvation from it.
Even their silver and their gold will not be able to keep them safe in the day of the Lord's wrath; but all the land will be burned up in the fire of his bitter wrath: for he will put an end, even suddenly, to all who are living in the land.
Before the Lord sends you violently away in flight like the waste from the grain; before the burning wrath of the Lord comes on you, before the day of the Lord's wrath comes on you.
For these are the days of punishment, in which all the things in the Writings will be put into effect. It will be hard for women who are with child, and for her with a baby at the breast, in those days. For great trouble will come on the land, and wrath on this people.
But by your hard and unchanged heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of the revelation of God's judging in righteousness;
But the present heaven and the present earth have been kept for destruction by fire, which is waiting for them on the day of the judging and destruction of evil men.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Zephaniah 1
Commentary on Zephaniah 1 Matthew Henry Commentary
An Exposition, With Practical Observations, of
The Prophecy of Zephaniah
Chapter 1
After the title of the book (v. 1) here is,
Such fair and timely warning as this did God give to the Jews of the approaching captivity; but they hardened their neck, which made their destruction remediless.
Zep 1:1-6
Here is,
Zep 1:7-13
Notice is here given to Judah and Jerusalem that God is coming forth against them, and will be with them shortly; his presence, as a just avenger, his day, the day of his judgment and his wrath, are not far off, v. 7. Those that improve not the presence of God with them as a Father, but sin away that presence, may expect his presence with them as a Judge, to call them to an account for the contempt put upon his grace. The day of the Lord will come. Men have their day now, when they take a liberty to do what they please; but God's day is at hand; it is here called his sacrifice, a sacrifice of his preparing, for the punishing of presumptuous sinners is a sacrifice to the justice of God, some reparation to his injured honour. Those that brought their offerings to other gods were themselves justly made victims to the true God. On a day of sacrifice great slaughter was made; so shall there be in Jerusalem; men shall be killed up as fast as lambs for the altar, with as little regret, with as much pleasure: The slain of the Lord shall be many. On a day of sacrifice great feasts were made upon the sacrifices; so the inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem shall be feasted upon by their enemies the Chaldeans; these are the guests God has prepared and invited to come and glut themselves-their revenge with slaughter and their covetousness with plunder. Now observe,
Zep 1:14-18
Nothing could be expressed with more spirit and life, nor in words more proper to startle and awaken a secure and careless people, than the warning here given to Judah and Jerusalem of the approaching destruction by the Chaldeans. That is enough to make the sinners in Zion tremble-that it is the day of the Lord, the day in which he will manifest himself by taking vengeance on them. It is the great day of the Lord, a specimen of the day of judgment, a kind of doom's-day, as the last destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans is represented to be in our Saviour's prediction concerning it, Mt. 24:27.