Zephaniah 3:14-17 (17) The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to
save.  He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his
love, he will rejoice over you with singing.

 I want you to think for just a moment about the song "Joy to the World."
 If you were to locate it in your hymnal do you know where it would be
found?  It would be found on page 62 under the heading "Christmas."  I've
always kind of wondered about that because this song written by Isaac
Watts had the original title "The Messiah's Second Coming and Kingdom."
In other words, the author wrote it as an advent song.  Yet somehow in
our modern day world this song has become a Christmas song.
 Think about that song.  It is a song with an advent message.  It speaks
of the Lord coming and the world receiving her king.  It speaks of the
Savior reigning, of sin, sorrow and thorn no longer growing, yes of the
Lord's coming to make his blessings flow.  The forth verse is especially
a verse that shows the advent nature of Jesus' coming.  It speaks of
Jesus ruling the world with truth and grace and how the nations will
yield to his glory and righteousness.  That's advent.  That's song is
about Jesus returning the second time to reestablish his forever kingdom
in the world.
 No wonder the song starts with the words, "Joy to the world."  This song
highlights the very attitude that is to be in our hearts.  It highlighted
that by pointing ahead to the joys that we have in Jesus the King of
kings and Lord of Lords.  It is the attitude that existed among the
angels when the Savior was born.  Of course, the angels understood the
promises of God and what the baby born in a manger would mean for all
eternity.  That baby was the epitome of joy.  That baby, because of who
and what he was, would indeed bring joy to this world, joy as never seen
before, the joy of his eternal kingdom and all the believing souls living
and ruling with him.
 Well, in a way perhaps we have answered why this song has become a
Christmas song.  The joy that it sings of is the joy that comes in and of
Jesus.  In other words, even at Christmas, as we kneel before the manger,
we can realize that in this Child is found all the wonderful promises of
bliss, happiness, love and eternal joy.  The message of Jesus is a
message of joy.
 Do you know that the joy that we are speaking of now was also a joy that
God's Old Testament people could have too!  This fact is clearly seen for
us in the words of Zephaniah.  Let's contemplate the wonderful joy God
gave him for his people.  Our theme will be: A MESSAGE OF JOY.  1st. A
message for God's children.  2nd. A message of God's victory.  3rd. A
message of God's love.
 Zephaniah was a prophet of the Lord who lived around the year 650 B.C.
It was a sad period of history for the people who had been chosen by God.
 By and large the people of the land of Judah had forsaken the true God
for idols of every kind.  There were services held at the Temple of God
but those services were void of any faith or confidence in God and his
grace.  The services had become exercises in self-righteousness and
pride.  God was no longer the focus rather the ritual of worship, the
human element of worship, the pleasing of the human soul was the focus.
False prophets were everywhere leading people to anything but God all in
the name of God.
 Into this mess came Zephaniah.  Zephaniah had one task.  He was to
proclaim God's message upon this wicked people.  It was not a pleasing
message that Zephaniah brought but an important one nonetheless.  Just
reading this short book can be a real eye opener.  The book starts with
an announcement of coming judgment, then a call to repentance.  After
that, further judgments are pronounced, woes are uttered to the
spiritually blind and then a fiery prophecy of universal judgment is
given.  All of this in just the first two chapters.
 I think you can see that Zephaniah's message was one of judgment.  He
was to preach to these people about the righteousness and justice of God
and how when God is cast aside by his people the people would face the
anger and just judgments of God.  It must have been a sad thing for
Zephaniah to do.  To tell these people of God's righteous anger over
their unbelief.  That's what it was, unbelief.  They did not believe what
God said and revealed.  They did not believe that God had the final say
and laugh in everything.  They figured that God could be ignored, that
when it suited their need God could be altered and changed although God
is changeless and is what He says he is.  It must have been a sad thing
for Zephaniah to do.
 Yet God does not leave his people hopeless.  God does not want his true
children, those who still believe in Him to think he had given up and
quit on them.  So God moves Zephaniah to speak the words of our text.
God extends his invitation of joy to the faithful.  He says, "Sing, O
daughter of Zion: Shout aloud, O Israel!  Be glad and rejoice with all
your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem."
 One of the first things you should note is who is being addressed here.
It is the daughter of Zion and Jerusalem spoken to, it is Israel
addressed in these words.  The significance of these words should not be
lost.  These words do not address the general population of Jews, those
who had clearly spurned and turned away from God.  These names are words
for the Holy Christian Church, the communion of Saints.  These names
refer to all who were still true believers in the Lord.  Zion is a
reference to the Mountain of the Lord where his covenant of promises was
given.  Israel is the name that refers to those who are the same faith
that the original Israel had.  Jerusalem is that place where God's Temple
was found.  The Temple was the very heart of the Old Testament religion
that pointed to the promises and grace of God as to be found in the
coming Messiah, the Savior of the World.  These are not hollow names, not
just names about physical things but rather names of God's spiritual
people, those who still truly believed in God.
 The believers are invited to sing, to shout, to be glad and rejoice with
all their heart.  God tells his faithful people that there is hope.  He
tells his faithful people not to let the horrid circumstances of unbelief
and its consequences weigh them down.  Instead they are to be filled with
singing and shouting, with joy and gladness.  Why these things are so, is
revealed in the next words.
 Those next words say, "The Lord has taken away your punishment, he has
turned back your enemy.  The Lord the King of Israel is with you; never
again will you fear any harm.  On that day they will say to Jerusalem,
'Do not fear, O Zion; do not let your hands hang limp.  The Lord your God
is with you, he is mighty to save.  He will take great delight in you, he
will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."
 Why is there joy?  We are told there is joy because the Lord is with
you.  Zephaniah very specifically said, "The Lord, the King of Israel, is
with you...and again...The Lord your God is with you."  It is when we pay
attention to the words that we learn the marvel of what is said here.
There is no doubt at all that here is a promise of the Messiah and what
he would come to do.
 Why do I say this is about the Messiah?  Because other prophecies had
spoken of the Messiah as the Lord the King and other prophecies had
spoken of the Messiah with the special phrase or name: God with us.  When
combined with other portions of God's Word and what God says the Messiah
would be and do we then know that these words pertain to him.  These
words are about Jesus.
 That joy that would be for God's people became real on Christmas Eve
with the birth of a baby boy, a birth unnoticed by the world yet heralded
by the angels.  That baby grew to manhood and began a ministry that would
change the face and course of the world.  It was a ministry filled with
signs and wonders, a ministry that proclaimed the Good News, a ministry
of love and sacrifice.
 That baby was not just a man, he was also the true and only Son of God.
Jesus was the Christ of God sent by God to bring the ultimate of joy to a
world of sin.  Zephaniah saw this wonder and was moved to write: Sing,
shout aloud, be glad and rejoice.
 Did you catch the reason this King, the Lord your God causes joy?  Our
passage said, "The Lord has taken away your punishment, he has turned
back your enemy...he is mighty to save.  All of this because the Lord is
with us.  There are those who would ignore or deny what these words
bespeak?  They fail to see how in Jesus these words came perfectly true.
How Jesus took away the punishment of hell on the cross.  How Jesus
defeated the greatest and truest enemies of mankind, Satan and death, by
his resurrection from the grave.  Yes, Jesus was and is mighty to save.
Jesus brought the perfection and wonder of God into this world just so he
could be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.  There is a message filled
with joy!  God has been with us and God has been mighty to save.
 Now if that were all that this section spoke of we would still be the
most blessed of people for hearing and believing what it said.  Yet there
is more.  Don't miss the words that I find especially dear: "Do not
fear...do not let your hands hang limp...He will take great delight in
you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with
singing."
 What is great about these words is that they point out the benefit we
have in the Lord.  The Lord chases away fear.  Seriously, what is there
to fear when you have Jesus on your side?  Guilt, punishment, Satan and
death are all powerless before us in Jesus.  And that is also the
emphasis of the words, "do not let your hands hang limp."  We are not to
stand around like a bunch of victims herded into a corner and slaughtered
at will.  Because God has taken care of fear, because God has already
gained the victory we are thus a people able to serve and bring our God
glory and honor.  Our faith is not one of shallow words and empty
promises, our faith is one of action and ability because of Jesus.
 So awesome is this wonder of the Lord in our lives that it is brought
home all the more in the last phrases.  God delights in us.  He is
thrilled with our presence before him, in our holiness found in his
redemption.  And my favorite phrase, "He will quiet you with his love."
When you have God's love pressing upon you what is there in the world
that could disturb or shatter the peace that is ours?  Just thinking on
these words alone is worth it.
 Finally we hear that God rejoices over us with singing.  I think of the
great chapters of the Bible that give us glimpses of his perfect heavenly
kingdom.  I think of how often those verses speak of the singing of the
multitudes before the throne of God and the sense of awe and wonder such
angelic voices bring.  Can you imagine God himself singing for you?  Can
you imagine God breaking forth in song just because of you?  That's what
these words indicate.  God is as excited and thrilled about our salvation
as we should be.  Truly this is a message of love.
 As Advent continues, may your focus be the joy and wonder of God's
salvation given to us in Jesus.  And then may you sing, shout and be
filled with gladness because Emmanuel has come to save.  Amen.