Latest / Admonition Podcast / An Overview Of The Minor Prophets - Ben Shanks - Dec. 28,2025

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An Overview Of The Minor Prophets - Ben Shanks - Dec. 28,2025 · Admonition Podcast

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some of the way I've been starting to look at how versus how the.
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how the uh Jewish people used to study the Bible.
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m If you look at the Bible as a whole, the Jewish people tended to divide it up into three sections, the Old Testament specifically.
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um They referred to the sections as the Tanakh, and I've got my Wikipedia reference up here, because I'll never be able to remember the names, but they are the Torah, which I
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think we're all familiar with, the Torah meaning the law,
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the ah
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the neviim, which meant the prophets, and the ketivim, which was the writings.
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So where we tend to block it up into five chunks, where we have the major prophets and the minor prophets, you have the uh books of poetry, the books of the law, generally what we
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refer to as the first five books of the Old Testament, and then the books of history.
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They would group the books of history in with the law.
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they would group the prophets all together and then the books of poetry were considered to be the writings.
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So when it was the poetry, the...
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Lost my word.
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Anyway, the books that were collected writings of different authors.
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So what I want to look at specifically is one small section that they kept on one scroll.
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They referred to it as the 12.
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So when the minor prophets were put together, they were put together as a single collection that were meant to be studied together.
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So when we look at the minor profits, one thing to keep in mind is the...
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the Hebrew writers were less concerned about chronology than most of the way we think about it today.
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So a great example of that is the last of the major prophets, um Daniel.
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There's been a lot of conflict between the way modern scholars look at the book of Daniel saying that Daniel can't be true because it isn't in chronological order.
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Daniel was never meant to be in chronological order.
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Daniel was meant to be a collection of stories from Daniel's life.
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And the order they were put in was an order that was meant to sequence and tell a story as a whole of Daniel's relationship with God and then how Daniel's relationship with God
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affected not just Israel, but also Babylon.
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In fact, one of the chapters in Daniel isn't even written from Daniel's perspective.
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It's Nebuchadnezzar that writes that one.
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So when we look at how the minor prophets were put together, also not in chronological order.
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So when we look at the way the Hebrews looked at the Tanakh they meant it to be meditation literature.
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So they arranged them in a way that helped facilitate you to be able to meditate on the word of God.
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So when we look at
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the minor prophets as a whole, if you were to put them in chronological order, the chronological order is not necessarily ah well-defined for us.
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So there's a little bit of guessing that has to go on with it, specifically the book of Joel, because Joel looks like it was older writing, but then there's references to
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scriptures that would have been put in later.
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So it looks like some of it was older writing than as it was compiled probably by Ezra.
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um It was put together with references to other authors, Isaiah, ah Daniel.
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There's references to other prophets in the Book of Joel.
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So it looks like when Ezra put those writings together, he included references so it would make sense.
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So if you were to look at kind of chronological order, you have Jodah, Amos, and Hosea, which were all
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pre-captivity.
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ah Then you have during the Israelite, during the uh
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Israel captivity, meaning the northern 10 tribes, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah.
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During the Judean captivity, Obadiah.
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And then after the return, have Haggaiah, Zechariah, Malachi, and probably Joel was compiled during that return time frame.
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So if we're to look at these kind of in chronological order, you have a story that is hidden in the way these are put together.
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that tells the story of Israel as a family.
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And it's a story that starts with a unfaithful to each other family and ends with a family that spreads to the whole world.
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So if you look at Hosea, Hosea starts with what story?
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What's the storyline at the beginning of Hosea?
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It's one of the most miserable stories in the Bible.
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his wife, who before becoming his wife was a prostitute.
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So it is a story that is a reflection of the way God viewed his relationship with Israel.
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She was an unfaithful wife.
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In fact, if I can remember exactly where the reference is, she was, ah he literally had to pay off her debts as part of the process.
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ah The children of the marriage were named terrible things, like unwanted.
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ah And so they were, it was a story where the entire story of Hosea's family was a reflection of the way God saw Israel.
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And as we keep going through these things, you see similar elements in most of the, uh most of the minor prophets, Jonah being kind of an exception to the rule.
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You see a framework in each of the prophets that is a declaration of what the current state is, a condemnation of whatever people they're talking about.
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In Obadiah, it's Esau, the nation of Esau, not necessarily the nation of Israel that's been cursed in that one.
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and then you see a reconciliation, and then you see through that reconciliation the entire world being blessed.
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So it's sort of a similar structure to most of the minor profits, that that's the structure they follow.
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But when we go through these and kind of put them in chronological order, they, as they go through and over the course of time, they're describing things that are currently
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happening.
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and you kind of see the dissolution of a family.
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So one of the things, one of the features that is pretty consistent in the Minor Prophets is it isn't referred to as a nation.
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It's referred to as a person.
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So who would the nation of Judah be referred to?
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What historical figure?
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Jacob.
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It refers to the nation of Judah in the first person as Jacob.
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When it's talking about Israel, what's the name that's used when it's referencing Israel?
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Any guesses?
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Yep, the nation with the lisp.
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And when it's referring to Edom, what is it referred to it as?
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What nation was Edom descended from?
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Esau.
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So you have a very personalized structure to the language that's used.
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It's very much almost like God is talking to his family as you go through the minor prophets.
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going through them as we go through it and chronologically speaking, ah the names of the prophets often have significance ah to who we're talking about.
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So when we look at Obadiah,
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Obadiah's name literally means slave of Yahweh.
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And it is the curse of Esau that is referenced in Obadiah.
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Jacob and Esau, did they get along well?
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Why?
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Jacob was a liar his entire life.
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Jacob was a miserable person.
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And you see God continually blessing Jacob even though he is this really kind of a terrible human being.
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because he's continuing the blessing, the promise that he gave to Abraham.
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Let's look at Abraham for a second.
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How many times did he fail before he was finally successful?
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How many trials did Abraham go through?
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twice with his wife, there were nine failures before there was finally a success.
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So as Abraham was learning to serve God, even he, who's known as the father of the faithful, had to grow to the point where he had the faith.
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What's the one where he was finally successful?
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the sacrifice of Isaac, that he was willing to give everything he loved before he was finally successful in his trials.
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So Jacob was a failure through all of his trials for the most part.
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So you have a nation who was established by a failure of a man, and so they were a failure of a people.
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Israel was a nation that struggled.
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constantly to be faithful to God.
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So when God frames up the minor prophets, he frames them up as this familial relationship that Israel was the unfaithful wife, starting in Hosea.
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Who was the most successful of the minor prophets?
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There was only one that was successful.
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Jonah.
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Jonah's a weird book.
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It is written not as prophecy.
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There is very personal prophecy in the book of Jonah.
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But the importance of Jonah was what?
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What was the purpose that Jonah was meant to serve?
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What was he called to do?
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Preached to Nineveh.
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Why?
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Nineveh was not the people of God.
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Did Jonah want to go?
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He did everything he could think of to avoid it.
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When he gets there, when he's finally forced to walk through Nineveh, he's so lazy in his preaching that his sermon is five words long.
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In 40 days, Nineveh's overthrown.
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They just walk through the city saying that.
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and they repented.
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So was he successful or was God's words to the Ninevites successful?
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God's words to the Ninevites were the only success in all of the minor prophets because we watch over the course of time, we watch Israel go into captivity with Assyria, we watch
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Judah go into captivity with Babylon, we watch the people return.
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a mere fraction of the people who were taken away.
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And we see a nation who is absolutely broken over the course of this.
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Amos.
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Amos is the burden bearer.
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He was told to go to the north and tell people tell them to repent from the worldly things.
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In Hosea.
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meaning salvation, it starts to describe the divorce of the Northern Kingdom.
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Micah, whose name means who is like God,
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is a lawyer.
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He's the one that handles the case of the divorce.
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So this framing narrative, it starts to feel very similar to modern society, right?
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The things that we see happen to our friends as they go through divorce, all the terrible things, the accusations, the strife, the struggle that comes with the breakup of a family.
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And we see Micah setting up the framework for the case.
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What's gonna be argued
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in these divorce proceedings?
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We see Israel being accused of idolatry.
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We see them being accused of evil plans, of covetousness, of materialism, of having leaders who only consider themselves, of witchcraft, of dishonesty, of corruption and
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treachery.
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We see.
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One faithful in this framework that God has always been faithful to his people, but we see the people of Israel described as terrible, as absolutely miserable.
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By this time, the people of Israel have been captured and Nahum prophesies about the destruction of Assyria.
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in Habakkuk whose name means embrace.
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we see Jacob finally being divorced.
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Zephaniah, the Lord is my treasure.
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So now we're getting into the post-exile.
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We're getting into the timeframe where.
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Nehemiah and Ezra have started to bring people back.
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That small group of all the Israelites who were captured and taken away, that small group who comes back and starts the process of rebuilding Jerusalem.
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and they start rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, but they're called out for leaving the temple in ruins.
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We see.
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this nation finally becoming back coming back clean.
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finally coming back as a people who are willing to serve God.
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I often think of the story of the Old Testament is the story of filtering a people.
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And that over the course of time, you're seeing the people get smaller and smaller and smaller as the impurities are taking out.
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And then finally you have a people who are willing to serve God, who are willing to throw idols out, who are willing m
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to dedicate themselves to the Lord.
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But we see a cleansing ritual, and then a hegei, whose name literally means my holiday.
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you see the rebuilding of God's home.
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than Zachariah, whose name means Yahweh remembers, you see that there's going to be a new head to the house.
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And that new head of this household is going to bless everyone, not just the people of Israel, but that the people of Israel are finally ready to fulfill that promise.
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What's the promise they were never able to receive?
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Were they ever a blessing to all nations?
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The closest you could probably point to would be King Solomon, right?
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Who was both a blessing and a curse.
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What did Solomon bring back and establish firmly in Israel?
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Idolatry.
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So he could have been a blessing.
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At the beginning, he had the right mindset.
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What did he ask for?
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What's the funny thing about wisdom?
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How do you gain wisdom?
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You gain wisdom through experience.
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A thousand significant others is quite a bit of experience.
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And all of them bringing their own idols, their own worship, their own gods of other nations into Israel, led Israel down a path that it required captivity to recover from.
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And then in Malachi, Malachi, whose name means messenger, was where you see the reconciliation.
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It's where you see the wife in this relationship finally coming back, accepting that there's a new head of the household coming, accepting that they are going to be a people.
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that are going to serve God.
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Now, how worthy is serving God?
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If you look at the first century and the negative first century Jews, what was the nation like?
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Conflict and war.
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You had four main factions inside.
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You had the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes, and the Zealots.
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How were these factions different than previous?
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What were the Pharisees?
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What were they?
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What did they see as in the important thing?
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The law.
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So much so that they built a framework and a structure beyond the structure that God had put in place.
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They wanted to build fences around the wall.
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I think a lot of it came with good intentions, but because they built a structure outside of the framework that God established, it became, um it lost its impact.
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So Jesus spends a lot of time, the Sermon on the Mount being an example, reframing what God meant when he gave the law, telling them that anger was just as bad as murdering
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people.
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What do the Sadducees believe?
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They didn't believe in the afterlife.
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They believed in the very physical nature of the world.
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And as such, they were more interested in power than they were in following God.
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What did the Zealots believe?
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Zealots believed that God would give them the power to become the nation they once were.
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And what did the Essenes do?
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They're the ones that generally aren't mentioned.
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They were like the monks of the Jewish nation.
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They were interested in preserving the word.
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They were interested in kind of isolating themselves from the rest of the world.
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But they were very religious.
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The Jews at this point had started establishing things like the Hebrew school, where they would teach you Hebrew.
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Why would you need to learn Hebrew?
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What language did the Jews speak?
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Aramaic.
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That's the language that Jesus spoke.
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Very similar to Hebrew, but not exactly the same.
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It was like a distant dialect of the same language.
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It was a Semitic language, but it was not exactly the same.
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So they established Hebrew school so that when people went to synagogue, they could read the scripture of God.
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They dwelled in the scripture of God.
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This was a people that was, for all their faults, the first time
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that Israel really cared about their faith to God.
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And it was a setup for that new head of the household to come in.
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So all this structure, all this framework that the minor prophets established built the path forward that Jesus could come.
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So when we look at what was being set up here through this process of filtering out a people who were flawed, a people who were failures, a people who struggled to even
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acknowledge God many times, they worship things like Molech and Baal.
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or bowl.
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Molec.
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where as part of establishing a new city wall, you would take your children and set them on fire on top of a statue and then put their corpse into the walls as you built them.
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These were terrible things that were done.
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And so when we look at what these people were leaving, they were leaving fear, they were leaving behind corruption, they were leaving behind all the things that Micah pointed out,
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that they were idolaters, evil plans, covetous, materialist, selfish, witchcraft, dishonesty, corruption, and treachery.
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So throughout this structure, throughout what we're seeing here is we're seeing.
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a marriage, a divorce, and a reconciliation.
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So if you look back at the oldest of the minor prophets, if look back at ah one of the oldest of the minor prophets, you look back at Hosea.
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That structure, that framework that's established in Hosea is the structure that all of the other minor prophets follow.
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And it was meant to be one continuous story from Hosea that was a framework and narrative of the struggle and the path that Israel went through.
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But it was also meant to give hope.
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This idea that was a very personal relationship with God is what was being established in the 12 Minor Prophets.
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When you look at, let me pull up a passage real quick.
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When you look at how this was established in.
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Joel chapter three.
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You see a promise being delivered by God to his people.
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For behold in those days and at that time I will restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem.
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I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat and I will enter into judgment with them there.
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On behalf of my people and my inheritance, Israel, whom they have scattered amongst the nations, they have divided up my land, they have also cast lots for my people, traded a
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boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine that they may drink.
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when we look at this promise that Joel's delivering.
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What is the promise that these new people, these negative first and first century Jews were looking at?
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was a return to the way they were before.
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Or was it?
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repentance.
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They were looking at a people who were repentant, that were restored.
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How long would the restoration of Jerusalem last?
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just under 500 years, about 400 years before, or about 500 years before, but it would last until what year?
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70 AD.
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What happened in 70 AD?
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Huh?
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Yeah, Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 AD.
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So how is this passage fulfilled?
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Was it fulfilled with the destruction of Jerusalem?
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What was established in Jerusalem?
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The church was established in Jerusalem.
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Was Jerusalem needed anymore?
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We had started a new kingdom.
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There was a new Jerusalem.
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A Jerusalem that was finally scattered to the world.
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So when we look at that third promise, that third promise that was given to Abraham, that the whole world would be blessed.
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That's what's being fulfilled here.
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This people had to be purified.
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They had to be cleansed.
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they had to be purged of their desire to do evil.
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Were they perfect?
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No.
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If you look at the Pharisees, they probably initially started trying, but ultimately ended in failure because they ignored the wisdom of God and tried to apply the wisdom of man.
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If you look at the Sadducees,
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They were very good at collecting the scripture, at making sure that it was copied, making sure that every synagogue had it because they saw it as a method of control.
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But they were a people who was utilizing and being used to save the word of God.
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If you look at the zealots, zealots were misguided in their application of the word, but they knew the word.
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They lived in Psalms, tainted by human vision of anger and jealousy and vengeance.
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But they were a people who were living with God's word.
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And the Essenes wanted to live with it so much that they put themselves in isolation from the rest of the world.
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But this was a people who were finally willing to understand.
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And all the people who weren't
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part of the faction.
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Most of the apostles, one being an exception, which apostle was part of one of these factions?
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Simon, he was a what?
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Zealot.
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But most of the apostles were common people.
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Fishermen, a tax collector.
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Most of the disciples that are mentioned later were pretty common people, business people, physicians.
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So all these people who were
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selected by Jesus to follow him were people who were used to living in the word.
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So they were people who are ripe for the harvest.
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And that harvest being when Jesus...
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was put on a tree before all the world.
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There was a small group of people there in front of him, but the whole world knows the story.
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and he was sacrificed for his creation, thereby completing what Zechariah foretold, that there would be a new head of the household, because as Zechariah's name means, Yahweh
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remembers.
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He remembers the promise that was delivered thousands of years before.
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over 1000 years before to Abraham.
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And he remembers a promise.
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That was delivered.
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Long before that.
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To who?
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Was it the atom?
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You had the right family.
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What was the promise to Eve?
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Yep.
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So that promise that was delivered at the very beginning in the garden was finally being fulfilled in here.
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So this name of Zachariah Yahweh remembers is a reflection on all the promises God has made throughout history.
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That God is always faithful that it doesn't matter how long ago the promise was made.
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that he remembers all throughout history.
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So when we look at the Minor Prophets as a whole, they're one complete story.
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They're the story of a promise broken.
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and of a husband with a very long memory.
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The head of the household who made promises, who made vows, who made vows to Eve, who made vows to Noah, who made vows to Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob, who made vows to Judah, who
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made vows to David, who made vows to all these minor prophets.
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that salvation would be delivered.
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And when we look at the history of the Old Testament, it's the story of a people who were unwilling to accept him until they were purged of all the things that were holding him
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back, all these evils that were detailed in Micah.
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We look at as a people who had to go through a divorce before they were willing to accept the marriage.
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And that's the story of all the minor prophets.
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When you put them in chronological order, it tells that story as we would think it would look like in a marriage.
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Starting with Jose or starting with Josea who goes through terrible, marries a terrible wife who was unfaithful to him.
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and yet he pays all of her debts off and accepts her back.
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You see in Micah the framework of legal proceedings, setting up the divorce and applying all the reasons for the divorce.
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And you see in Zechariah that God remembers.
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all the promises he made all throughout the story of God's people.
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And in Malachi, you see them finally being reconciled.
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So flipping over to Malachi, chapter four.
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This is how the Old Testament ends.
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Remember the law of Moses, my servant, even the statutes and ordinances which I commanded him in Horeb for all of Israel.
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Behold, I am going to send you Elijah, the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord, and he will restore the hearts of the father and to their
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children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the land with a curse.
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It's a final reminder to this people that not only
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Are they being remembered?
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And all the promises that were delivered in the law of Moses.
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But the same rules apply as they did before.
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Who's responsible for holding true to the promises?
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who is responsible for breaking them.
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It's people.
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So he's pointing out that this same promise holds true and it's up to you, a renewed people, a people with a zeal that never existed before, to hold true to these promises.
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And historically speaking, it looks like they generally did.
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They were a people who were humbled.
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If you look at Israel, were they ever known for their humility?
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What did Job learn?
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What was the point of all of his trials?
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He had to learn humility.
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He was generally a good man, but he needed humility.
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Israel needed humility.
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They were a proud people.
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How did they refer to the people around them?
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There were Jews and then there were what?
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How do they refer to the Samaritans?
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Dogs.
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There were people who lived in.
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Way more pride.
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Then they deserved.
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And so there were people who needed to be humbled.
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There were people who had to remember the law and had to remember.
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who they were serving.
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And what's the promise that God delivers here in verse five?
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I'm gonna send you who.
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Why Elijah?
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So who's that?
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John, Jesus' cousin.
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He's gonna come and prepare the way for the great and terrible day of the Lord.
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What does that mean?
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great and terrible day of the Lord.
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This is another theme that's all throughout the Minor Prophets, last one for today.
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What is the day of the Lord?
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It can.
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It could be national judgment.
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What happens on the Day of the Lord?
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What's going to happen on the day of the Lord we're looking forward to today?
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It's all going to end.
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So when you see this reference, the day of the Lord, it means the world is going to change.
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That God is bringing change directly to the world.
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So sometimes that's judgment.
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Sometimes it's the divorce of Israel.
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Sometimes it's the divorce of Judah.
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In this case, what is the day of the Lord?
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It's the final fulfillment of all of his promises.
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So he's sending Elijah to prepare people for the day of the Lord.
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What did John the Baptist preach?
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that he preached salvation.
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He preached coming salvation, but his message itself was repent.
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For the kingdom is at hand.
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The salvation came with the kingdom.
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So he wasn't a preacher who was there to.
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Bring about salvation.
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He was a preacher that was there to bring about repentance.
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Because in the coming day of the Lord.
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All salvation would be delivered.
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So that's my takes on the themes of the Minor Prophets.
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It's a very beautiful story.
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It took me several months a couple years ago to kind of study through this.
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uh But it's a beautiful story when it's framed up as uh almost a family, watching a family, a very personal view.
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It frames the...
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narrative in a structure that is very personal.
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Instead of Israel, instead of Hebrews, instead of Jews, instead of Edomites, it is Jacob, it is Ephraim, it is Esau.
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It is very personalized when these prophets deliver God's message.
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God wants a personal relationship with his people.
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And it's very evident in the structure that is in the Minor Prophets.
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That is the way God sees us.
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On a very personal level.
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He sees us as a people to be loved.
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In spite of all of our flaws.
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And he sees us as a people who can be worthy of his promise.
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And that's the story of the minor prophets.
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I think it's very significant that.
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When they were put together, they were all put on the same scroll together.
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and they were put there through God's guidance so that it would be one story that we could see of this entire relationship that his people had with him and how terrible they were at
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it and how much he loved them and how much he was willing to sacrifice.
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So that's it for today.