-Have you ever noticed the way people seem to react like a pendulum? You look at the White House, and doesn’t it seem to flip to the other party every 4 (or 8) years? People don’t like what’s taking place so they assume the opposite must be better. Maybe you’ve seen it in people dating: you see someone going through a breakup, and the next time you see them dating someone it’s the exact opposite of their ex! Or in churches, I’ve seen a tendency to react to the weaknesses of a previous pastor by only hiring a next pastor who has those strengths (without realizing there are DIFFERENT weaknesses that will come with that).

-A similar thing seems to be taking place throughout these prophets. One prophet talks about one area of focus, and then the next prophet comes along and brings up a different perspective on it. Last week, in Amos, we say the prophet calling out God’s people for their lack of justice. This week, the prophet will be calling out a different nation for their lack of justice.

READ/PRAY (pg. 819)

1. The Message of Obadiah:

-We need to understand some family history in order to know what Obadiah is talking about. Does anyone know the history of the nation of Edom, where they came from? All the way back in Genesis there are twin boys born who have conflict with each other from the womb to the tomb: Jacob and Esau. We’ve previously studied the beginnings from Gen. 1-11 and Father Abraham in Gen. 12-25, but that’s where we stopped. So Abraham eventually becomes the Father of the Israelite people, but his promised child is Isaac. Isaac becomes the father of Esau and Jacob, the twins who were in conflict with each other, even before they were born! There was so much conflict that Rebekah asked the Lord what was going on and He told her:

-When they’re born, it says Esau came out “red-looking” which sounds like the word for “Edom.” And that theme continues: Jacob is described as a quiet man who stays home, while Esau is the outdoorsman, the successful hunter, Esau is loved by his father while Jacob is loved by his mother. Their lives are continual conflict. One day, while Esau is out hunting, Jacob is at home cooking. Esau comes home “exhausted” and demands that Jacob give him some of the “red stuff” (adom) to eat. Jacob is shrewd and agrees IF Esau will give Jacob his birthright in return. In this culture, the oldest received the inheritance, and no one else did.

-Then, as Isaac is getting old, he realizes he needs to bless Esau, his inheritor, but Rebekah overhears and tricks Isaac by having him bless Jacob instead of Esau. When Esau finds out he’s furious and demands a blessing from Isaac. And look at the blessing Isaac gives:

-Church, don’t miss that the Bible is completely honest about the whole experience of humans! Genesis is basically a case study in family dysfunction! Dishonestly, backstabbing, deception, and abuse are normal!

-There is a bit of a happy ending to this story, at least the last biblical account of their interactions. Jacob runs away from Isaac and Rebekah and goes to live with his uncle Laban, ends up marrying his cousins (plural, and sisters, which is apparently not illegal at this time!), and grows incredibly wealthy. Eventually he leaves his uncle with his whole family and runs into his brother Esau again. But look at how this meeting begins:

-Just as God promised, there would be 2 nations that would come from Rebekah’s womb: Israel and Edom. Edom existed southeast of Israel, not an easy area for agriculture, as you can see in THIS picture, these are the mountains of Seir in Edom (which we just read about). These mountains served as a natural barrier and protection from other invading armies, which led to a misguided pride for the Edomites. They viewed themselves as essentially impenetrable at the time, which will be called out by God in this book!

-But the conflict that started in the womb continues down through their descendants! When Israel is led out from Egypt, they ask the Edomites to let them through and here’s how they reply. And on it goes! King Saul fights them, King David fights them, and then they revolt against King Solomon. But then comes the final straw. The Babylonians attack Judah in 586 BC, and instead of coming to help their brother, the Edomites attack Judean forts near their territory. And this event seems to be what Obadiah is talking about when he brings this prophesy to them. So let’s get to the book:

1. Judgment on Edom (1-14)

-Same as Joel, we know nothing about Obadiah apart from his name! As I shared at the beginning, the general beginning is the name of the prophet followed by the kings who were on the throne during their ministry which gives us dates for many of the prophets, but Obadiah is one that gives us none of that information!

-Let’s look at what God condemns them for right away: pride. Think of what Prov. 16:18 says (as I heard it from when I was growing up, the KJV)

-Pride is trying to build yourself up, looking down on others so that you can feel superior to any and everyone else. And pride is sinful. At its core it is an anti-god approach to life. CS Lewis wrote an entire chapter of Mere Christianity dedicated to the sin of pride, listen to what he says:

-Here he’s saying that pride leads us so far as to even look down on God. Pride was at the root of the devil’s fall because he was looking down on God! And that same pride that affected the devil affects us today, which is where he continues:

-Since God is so far above and beyond us, it requires us comparing ourselves to the right standard. Think of what we read in Amos 5 last week where Amos sees God standing with a plumbline. A prideful person is the one who accuses God of using the wrong standards! Pride is what leads to Jacob being a trickster and stealing his brother’s birthright, pride is what leads to Esau being careless about his birthright, and friends, humanity hasn’t changed in the last 4,000 years, because pride is still one of the prevailing sins in the world today. Our entire economic system is built on pride: assuming that people will always be wanting more and more and building bigger and bigger. I don’t have any alternative proposals because that has been the root of economics for a LONG time, but I think it’s true.

-But it also runs contrary to the way of Jesus. Look at how Lewis describes a humble person: do you see the contradiction here? He’s not saying you have to think less about yourself, he’s saying true humility is on a completely different plane: it’s someone who is finally able to get beyond themselves and start thinking about and caring about others. Tim Keller (who loved Lewis) summarized this idea this way:

-God’s way is completely different than what the world wants us to pursue. Edom is representing the way of the world which means they stand condemned by God. And this serves as a warning for us too! We can be so prideful that we refuse to admit we need help. If you haven’t heard the name, there’s a former Nebraska senator named Ben Sasse (who’s also a Christian) who in December announced that he had been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. He has enough accolades and worldly success that he announced it through a press release, but I’ve been so edified reading or hearing various interviews he’s conducting as he’s facing his end because he’s shared that it’s causing him to look back on the ways pride affected him and family, and unless we admit that we’re needy people, we won’t ever get to that point. Edom is condemned for the sin of pride, we are still prone to that same sin today unless, through grace-driven effort, we work to shift the focus from ourselves to others.

-Think back to what I shared at the beginning of Edom’s refusal to help when Judah was being attacked. Instead of helping, Obadiah says they stood aloof, they wanted some of the riches, they acted just like the rest of the nations. Which means Edom is included in the punishment that’s coming on the nations:

• Judgment on the Nations (15-18)

-One of the brilliant ways Obadiah works to get this point across is he uses the word “day” repeatedly building up to this: 8, 11, 12, 13, 14 before landing on THE day. I spent some time when I preached on Joel talking about the day of the Lord, we’ll look at it in more detail in a few weeks, but the short summary is during this time, God’s people were waiting for the day of the Lord because they viewed it as the day God will destroy all their enemies, but Obadiah gives us a different perspective.

-After increasingly building up these various days, we get to the Day of the Lord as being near, and this time instead of being against God’s people it’s against “all the nations.” But Obadiah doesn’t stop there with a warning, he tells them exactly what they can expect here: “as you have done, it will be done to you,” this is the opposite of the golden rule! If they had followed the golden rule they’d be in a different place at THE day. He goes on to talk about drinking, and in many cases throughout the Bible this is referring to drinking a cup of judgment.

-And look at the end of these nations in the next verses:

-Where will deliverance come from? Mount Zion, Jerusalem, from Judah. Everyone who oppressed God’s people will find themselves oppressed, just as Edom pursued the survivors of Judah, they will be pursued, attacked, and will have no one left. And just as we saw last week at the end of Amos, this is guaranteed to happen because the Lord has spoken.

-But unlike last week, that’s not where Obadiah ends!

• Restoration of God’s People (19-21)

-While Edom mocked Judah when they were destroyed, the irony is Edom is eventually destroyed by the same nation. So as they did to Judah was literally done to them. Once again, Obadiah repeats a word through this section to drive home a point: possess. Just as all these nations were once possessed by others, the day is coming when God’s people will “possess” all these other lands.

-The last verse alludes to the book of Judgeswhere the Lord raises many “saviors” or “deliverers” to help with the various enemies who were fighting against God’s people. But none of them could ever establish a full and lasting dynasty for the people, they all fell short. Even David’s dynasty only lasted through his grandson! But someday David’s descendent will come to Jerusalem to rule over everything. Does anyone have any ideas who that might be?

• The Inclusion of the Nations

-Friends, this is where God’s guidance of all the events in human history shines the brightest and should give us the most amount of hope! See, here God predicts the complete destruction of the nation of Edom, of Esau. But what does that look like in reality? In 553 BC, Edom was conquered by the Babylonians (remember the 2 mountains: close future and far future). The close future was they had the same punishment as Judah, the FAR future tells a different story, and to understand exactly what’s taking place there, we need to go back to the beginning.

-Adam and Eve are provided everything they need to live a flourishing life. They are in perfect harmony with God, themselves, and the rest of the creation. God gave them 1 boundary: don’t eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. See, when they were created, they only knew good! But pride (as we saw earlier) led to them wanting to take the place of God. Satan tempts them with that reality by telling them God didn’t have their best in mind and if they eat from that forbidden fruit they would become like God. What they failed to realize was they already were!

-Look at what God says: when does God say they would die? In the DAY they eat from it! But do they die? No! Friends, we can’t even begin to comprehend God’s grace toward His creation. Now, some people will say that they spiritually died, and that’s probably a part of it, but God doesn’t stipulate that it would be limited in any way, He says they will die. Period. Instead, what happens? God gives them grace, He clothes them (just like He had done in creating them). Friends, our God is the God of life, not death! He hates death, death is an enemy to be defeated! And we also see that reality with Edom.

-For the far future of Edom, after they were conquered by the Babylonians, there weren’t many descendants left, and the Arabs from the east eventually began encroaching on their territory, so they moved into the land of Judah which became known as Idumea. Now, there’s 1 horrible Idumean that comes up in the Gospels, his name is Herod, and we read about him in Matt. 2. He’s the one who tried to kill Jesus when He was a child. The family conflict between Jacob and Esau carried down all the way to Jesus! Herod slaughters any boy under 2 years old around Bethlehem. One final act of Edom belittling Judah. But Herod dies, and Jesus lives. The way of Esau only offers death, while the way of Jacob leads to life.

-The only time Idumea appears in the Bible is in Mark 3. This is towards the beginning of Jesus’ ministry where he’s starting to preach and share the gospel message with the nations. But look where some of these early followers came from:

-Friends, God’s invitation is to repent and come to Him! Apart from His mercy and grace the only future hope is in judgment. But we see that NO ONE is too far away for Him to save! Everyone is invited to align themselves with God’s family and have a different trajectory for their life. WE, all of us, were once like Edom. We were once enemies who were doing everything we could (willingly or unwillingly) to fight against God’s plans for the world. Paul talks about this reality in Col. 1. Some translations use “enemies” for where this says hostile. God doesn’t save people because He likes the way they look or they somehow clean up their act enough to get His attention. God says at the time when we were his enemies, Jesus still reconciled us to Himself. And now, how does God see us? As holy, faultless, and blameless. Even Esau, Edomites, and Idumeans are welcome to be a part of this new family of God, which means there’s hope for everyone in this room! But it demands a choice, and not just a one-time choice, a daily working to continue following after Jesus every day, which is what Paul goes on to say here: grounded, steadfast, not shifted. Friends cling to Christ!

-And when we are saved, what is the correct way to respond to God?

• The Response of God’s People

-When God acts, we worship. This has been true since the very beginning of creation! When God brings Eve to Adam he sings a song of praise. When God leads His people out of slavery in Egypt, and then defeats the Egyptian army in the Red Sea, look how they respond:

-“He has become my salvation.” Friends, that’s the song every one of us should be lining up to sing! All these people that we read about in the OT could only dream of what we get to experience every day of our lives! Our habits, our practices, our routines should all be shaped by the reality that the Lord is our salvation. That’s the focus and goal of every Sunday morning. One of the themes that has come up through the prophets already is that we need to get God right, and in order to get God right, we need to get our worship of God right because our worship shapes and informs the way we see God.

-If you pay attention to it, you can see we have a rhythm that guides each Sunday. It’s rooted in historical Christian tradition, which is guided by Scripture, and looks to be acceptable to God. One of the words that drives me NUTS that often gets connected to worship is “authentic.” It was one of the core values of the previous church I was at, and I died a little inside every time I had to say it, because we don’t just come to God as we are, we come to God through the shed blood of Jesus Christ, otherwise God will not accept our worship! Look at how the author of Hebrews puts it: By referring to “consuming fire” he’s talking about an event in the OT where Aaron’s sons offered to God “strange fire” and were killed, so we need to be careful in our worship of the one true and living God.

-The second key comes from Col. 3. We begin seeing the reality that we are 1 body, which tells us this is something we’re supposed to do together, with 1 voice, united together (and by the way, be thankful, even if you don’t like the music. Especially if you don’t like the music!)

-What does Paul say the focus of our worship should be? To let the Word of Christ dwell richly among you. One great question to ask of any church you visit is: how long does it take to have the Bible opened? I had a guy who did NOT like the music we sang at church, and he made sure I knew it! He would stand in the aisles with his arms crossed staring at me anytime we sang a “new” song, and would sing as loud as he could anytime we sand an old song. Instead of only focusing on what we like, we should focus on what the song teaches us about the Bible. AND music is supposed to be a way we can teach and encourage each other (which means we should be able to hear each other singing)

-Do you see the variety Paul talks about too? Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. There isn’t only 1 style of music that can be used to worship God. “And whatever” anything else we do should bring honor and glory to God.

-Friends, our entire worship service is important. We have announcements at the beginning so we can know practical ways to love and care for each other, we have Scripture read to orient our hearts to God, we respond to who God is through singing. We gather to confess our sins because when we confess our sins God is faithful to forgive our sins and cleanse us. We remind each other truths from the Bible in recitations, catechisms, creeds. We corporately pray together for various needs in our body. We have exhortation and teaching from the Word of God, and we respond to that exhortation with more singing. See, part of the reason we sing after the message is because we need to respond together to the truths we’re learning from the Word. I hope those songs give time for the truths that we’ve heard go from our heads to our hearts, and then we end with a benediction from God’s Word before being sent to live out the new reality we’ve learned together with our hands.