Bible Passage: Zephaniah 2:3, 3:11-13
Pastor: Joel Jenswold
Sermon Date: January 29, 2023

Bulletin January 29, 2023

In the name of, and to the eternal glory of, Jesus,

What does it mean to be “at the top”?  The term is used often in our culture.  It is used when talking about the person who has become the best or most successful at what he or she does.  The MVP is described as being at the “top of his game.”  Taylor Swift is at the top of the pop music industry, causing Ticketmaster to crash over demand for tickets to her upcoming tour.  The doctor doing groundbreaking research in cancer or virology is at the top of his or her field.

What does it take to get to, and remain at, the top?  Drive.  Grit.  Determination.  Resiliency.  Focus. Hard work.  In some cases, ruthlessness.  Let me add another.  Ego.  Pride.  It is not uncommon to hear those “on top” say things like, “I was determined to be number one!”  “The thought of someone being better than me drives me.”  “I want to be the best!”

How different is the kingdom of God!  In fact, as typically happens, in the kingdom of God, God flips things upside down.  Pride is no virtue; but humility is.  In our text from Zephaniah today, the lesson of humility is taught at the “hill of the Lord.”   Who sits atop the hill of the Lord?  The Humble Sit Atop the Hill of the LORD.

 Our text is difficult to understand without a little backstory.  The short little prophecy of Zephaniah largely contains threats of the Lord’s coming judgment.  The Lord was going to bring judgment on the heathen nations around Israel, but also on all in Israel who had turned away from him.  As one reads the entire book of Zephaniah and reads the case the Lord lays out against those he will judge, one notices that their offenses in many cases fell into the category of “pride.”  Here’s what I mean.

The LORD threatens judgment on the religious pride he sees.  The nations around Israel proudly worshiped false gods.  There were many in Israel who proudly joined in the worship of these false gods like Baal.  The LORD confronted those who proudly relaxed and said, The LORD will not do anything good.  Neither will he do anything bad. (1:12)  How proud must you be to say the LORD was a wishy-washy, do-nothing God!  The LORD describes the priests and prophets as proud, reckless, and treacherous men (3:4).  Everywhere there was religious pride!

There was also political pride.  The LORD charges Israel’s neighbors Moab and Ammon because they have taunted my people and made proud claims against their territory. (2:8)  The LORD says he is going to stretch out his hand against Assyria and its capital, Nineveh.  Here is why.  This was the smug city that lived secretly and, that said to herself, “I am!  There is none that compares to me!”  (2:15)  Did you catch the pride?  Nineveh says, “I AM.”  That’s the name of the LORD!  This government power was talking as though it was God!  Even in Israel, the LORD described the leaders this way:  The officials within her are like roaring lions.  Her judges are like hungry wolves in the evening that completely devour their prey by morning. (3:3)  The leaders were ruthless and brutal.  Imagine, Jerusalem, that City Set on a Hill, the Lord’s holy hill, filled with the proud and the arrogant.  All these people thinking they were on top of the world!

Pride is the tell-tale sign of man disconnected from God.  When man disconnects from God, he becomes filled with pride.  He becomes his own god.  Men form governments and  believe they are the “Giver of all good things” to the governed.  Proud man’s motto becomes “I AM.”  Man is consumed with self.  Pride can be as silly and dumb as taking endless “selfies” or it can be as diabolical as commanding genocide against a race of people who aren’t like “I AM.”  It is pride that drives one to be “on top,” and it doesn’t much care if this means everyone else is crushed to the bottom.  Pride easily sloughs it off.  “I’m sorry,  how does that affect ME??”

But in our text, the Lord says he is going to get together a little group – a “remnant” they are called – of the weak and humble.  Seek the LORD, you humble people of the earth. (2:3)  The Lord says he is going to give his holy hill to THEM!  He says, I will remove the proud boasters from among you, and you will never again be arrogant on my holy hill. (3:11) What is this “holy hill”?  Where is this “holy hill”?  The Lord here is speaking about his Church.  He is speaking about the people he has chosen and purified.   YOU are one of the humble and weak people who even now sits atop this hill of the Lord!

The Lord always likes weakness and humility.  Just scan the pages of your Bible and see how the Lord delights in, and uses, the weak and the humble.  The Lord will take Moses, a man who is described in the Bible as more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth (Numbers 12:3), and use him to lead God’s people from Egypt to the Promised Land.  The Lord will take little David and use him to defeat the monster Goliath.  When Mary is told she will bring the Christ into the world, she sings, My soul now magnifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful of the humble state of his servant…He has performed mighty deeds with his arm; he has scattered those who are proud in the inmost thoughts.  He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. (Luke 1:46-48, 51-52)

And of course we look at Mary’s son, Jesus.  God in flesh.  Yet, cradled in a lowly manger.  Raised in a lowly village.  Followed by lowly men.  He is the one who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:6-8)  There atop that holy hill called Calvary is Jesus humbly giving his life, his all, for sinners.

Humility is God at work within you.  It is Jesus’ humility being reflected out from you into the world.  It is hard to be an egomaniac when you have stood on the holy hill and watched Jesus give his life for you.  At the cross, our lives change.  We are humbled, and become humble.  Our lives now begin to mimic and mirror our humble Lord.  We realize we don’t have to scratch and claw our way to the top, we will be happy to love and serve from the bottom up.  Teens, you do not have to be rough and ruthless.  You do not have to have the most followers or the most “likes” or the most views or the most “clicks” in order to be “somebody.”  You ARE somebody, because Jesus loves you and gave himself for you.  Your value and worth were fixed at the humble cross where Jesus died for you, and at the lowly font where Jesus claims you, and holds you, and washes you.  And Jesus himself says this humble life is the blessed life, Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. (Matthew 5:5)

The proud and the arrogant do not wind up “on top.”  In fact, the lowest place of all is reserved for them.  It is the humble follower of Jesus who is “on top.”  The humble child of God sits atop the holy hill of the Lord.

Amen.