God Sings Over You Like a Song

Not long before Habakkuk climbed his wall to wait for God, another prophet walked the streets of Jerusalem. His name was Zephaniah. The Bible lists his father, his grandfather, his great-grandfather, and his great-great-grandfather, named Hezekiah, most likely good King Hezekiah himself. (Most prophets get their father's name and stop there. Zephaniah's list goes back four men.)

Young King Josiah was on the throne, but the city had gone wrong. At night, people climbed onto their flat roofs and bowed down to the stars. The leaders grabbed whatever they could, like roaring lions, like wolves that leave not one bone by morning. And people sat back and yawned, "The LORD won't do anything, good or bad."

So God gave Zephaniah hard words to carry. "I will search Jerusalem with lamps," God said, "and punish the ones who say I will do nothing." A dark day was coming, a day of storm clouds and thick darkness. Zephaniah warned and warned, page after page.

But God also promised to leave a humble people in the middle of the city, who would run to his name to hide. And at the very end, Zephaniah's warnings turned into a song.

"Sing, daughter of Zion!
Shout, Israel!
Be glad, Jerusalem,
glad with your whole heart!
The LORD has taken your punishment away.
He has chased your enemies off.
The King of Israel, the LORD,
is right here in the middle of you.
You will never need to fear harm again."

To people whose heads hung down and whose hands had gone limp, the song said:

"Don't be afraid, Zion.
Don't let your hands drop.
The LORD your God is right in the middle of you,
a mighty one who saves.
He will be glad over you with joy.
He will hush you with his love.
He will shout over you with singing!"

Those people had been climbing onto their roofs to bow to the stars. Now the God who made the stars was going to sing over them, loudly, the kind of singing that makes the neighbors lean out of their windows.

Then God himself spoke:

"I will gather the ones who are sad
because they miss the feast days.
I will deal with everyone who hurt you.
I will save the ones who limp.
I will gather the ones who were pushed out,
and turn their shame into praise
all over the earth.
At that time I will bring you home,
and give back what you lost
while you watch."

King Josiah did pull down the altars on the roofs and smash them to pieces. But after he died, Jerusalem turned away from God again. Babylon's army came, burned the city and the temple, and marched the people far away. Even after some came home, they kept waiting for the day the King himself would stand in the middle of them.

More than six hundred years after Zephaniah, a king rode into Jerusalem on a donkey, and the crowds shouted for joy, the way Zephaniah's song had told them to. The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them. Children shouted "Hosanna!" to him in the temple courts. "Do you hear what they are saying?" the leaders snapped. "Yes," said Jesus, and he let them keep praising him.

The King of Israel was standing in the middle of Jerusalem at last, just as Zephaniah sang. And one of the letters in the Bible says that Jesus stands in the middle of the family he gathers and sings praise to God with them.