Zephaniah 2:3

Seek ye the LORD, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the LORD's anger. SEEK YE THE LORD, ALL YE MEEK OF THE EARTH ... SEEK RIGTEOUSNESS, SEEK MEEKNESS. As in (cf. note, ), he had warned those hardened among the people (like the "lees," or crust formed beneath wines long undisturbed) to humble themselves, so now he admonishes "the meek" to proceed in their right course, that so they may escape the general calamity (). The meek bow themselves under God's chastisements to God's will, whereas the ungodly become only the more hardened by them. SEEK YE THE LORD - in contrast to those that "sough...

Here the Prophet turns his discourse to a small number, for he saw that he could produce no effect on the promiscuous multitude. For had his doctrine been addressed in common to the whole people, there were very few who would have attended. We would therefore have been discouraged had he not believed that some seed remained among the people, and that the office of teaching and exhorting had not been in vain committed to him by God. But he shows at the same time that the greater part were wholly given up to destruction. We now see why the Prophet especially addresses the _meek of the land_; for few undertook the yoke, though they had been already broken down by many calamities. And it hence appears that the fruit of correction was not found equal in all, for God had chastised the good and the bad, the whole people, from the least to the greatest; they had all been laid prostrate by many e...

1-3 The prophet calls to national repentance, as the only way to prevent national ruin. A nation not desiring, that has not desires toward God, is not desirous of his favour and grace, has no mind to repent and reform. Or, not desirable, not having any thing to recommend them to God; to whom God might justly say, Depart from me; but he says, Gather together to me that you may seek my face. We know what God's decree will bring against impenitent sinners, therefore it highly concerns all to repent in the accepted time. How careful should we all be to seek peace with God, before the Holy Spirit withdraws from us, or ceases to strive with us; before the day of grace is over, or the day of life; before our everlasting state is determined! Let the poor, despised, and afflicted, seek the Lord, and seek to understand and keep his commandments better, that they may be more humbled for their sins....

Verse Zephaniah 2:3. _YE MEEK OF THE EARTH_] ענוי _anavey_, ye _oppressed_ and _humbled_ of the land. _IT MAY BE YE SHALL BE HID_] The sword has not a commission against you. Ask God, and he will be a refuge to you from the storm and from the tempest....

SEEK YE THE LORD - He had exhorted sinners to penitence; he now calls the righteous to persevere and increase more and more. He bids them “seek diligently” , and that with a three-fold call, to seek Him from whom they received daily the three-fold blessing Numbers 6:23, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as he had just before threatened God’s impending judgment with the same use of the mysterious number, three. They, whom he calls, were already, by the grace of God, “meek,” and “had wrought His judgment.” Rup.: “Submitting themselves to the word of God, they had done and were doing the judgment of God, ‘judging themselves that they benot judged;’ the beginning of which judgment is, as sinners and guilty of death, to give themselves to the Cross of the Lord, that is, to be ‘baptized’ in ‘His Death and be buried with Him by Baptism into death;’ but the perfection of t

EXPOSITION. VERSE 2:1-3:8 Part II. EXHORTATION TO REPENTANCE AND TO PERSEVERANCE. ZEPHANIAH 2:1 § 1. The prophet urges all to examine their ways before the day of the Lord come; and he prays the righteous to seek the Lord more earnestly, in order that they may be safe in the judgment. ZEPHANIAH 2:1 GATHER YOURSELVES TOGETHER. So the versions; and this rendering is probably correct. The prophet calls upon his nation to assemble themselves together in order to take mutual counsel or to make general confession and supplication to God. Another rendering, based on some alteration

SEEK YE THE LORD, ALL YE MEEK OF THE EARTH,.... Or "of the land", of the land of Judea. In this time of great apostasy, there was a remnant according to the election of grace, whom the Lord reserved for himself, and bestowed his grace upon; and it is for the sake of these that the general exhortations to repentance and reformation are given out, to whom alone they were to be useful, that they might be protected and preserved from the general ruin; for such as are here described are persons the Lord takes great notice of; he gives them more grace; he lifts them up when bowed down; he beautifies them with salvation; he feeds them to full satisfaction; he teaches them his ways, his mind and will; he dwells with them here, and will cause them to inherit the new heaven and new earth hereafter: they are such who have a true sense of sin, and the exceeding sinfulness of it, which humbles them;...

CHAPTER S 2-3:8 The Call to Repentance in View of the Judgment _ 1. The call to repentance (Zephaniah 2:1) _ 2. The judgment of the Philistines (Zephaniah 2:4) 3. The judgment of Moab and Ammon (Zephaniah 2:8) 4. The judgment of the other nations (Zephaniah 2:11) 5. The woe and warning to Jerusalem and His people (Zephaniah 3:1) Zephaniah 2:1. As we found it in Joel, so it is here. In view of the co

ZEPHANIAH 2. DOOM ON PHILISTIA [MOAB AND AMMON], ETHIOPIA, AND ASSYRIA. Zephaniah 2:1. Having spent its rage on Judah, the storm of Divine judgment sweeps south by the Philistian sea-board, uprooting cities and their inhabitants, driving them off like chaff, and leaving the once fertile plain a pasturage for shepherds and folds for flocks. ZEPHANIAH 2:1. The meaning of the first words is highly uncertain. An attractive suggestion yields, Get you shame, yea, be abashed, O nation unabashed, the reference being to the Philistines, rather than Judah, as many scholars maintain. Zephaniah 2:2. The text here is both corrupt and overladen. The original should perhaps be reduced to read, Ere ye be

SEEK... SEEK. Reference to Pentateuch (Deuteronomy 4:29), as in Zephaniah 1:6. JUDGMENT. ordinances; as in Isaiah 58:2.Jeremiah 8:7. YE SHALL BE HID. Referring to Isaiah 26:20, and the meaning of the name Zephaniah....