The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save. He will rejoice over you with gladness; He will quiet you by his love, he will exalt over you with loud singing.
– Zephaniah 3:17
Zephaniah 3:17, is that not an awesome verse? God speaking to his people, especially when you think about how this chapter begins with God’s pronouncement of judgment on all those who don’t trust in him, who turn from him, who do injustice and work iniquity and live in idolatry and pride before him. And then there’s a shift in verse 14. Just talking about how God will save those who look to him and trust in him. And then you get to verse 17.
Let me just read it again. This is obviously God speaking to his people in the Old Testament, through Zephaniah at this time. But just think, this is your God. For all of you who are listening right now, who have put your trust in Jesus, who’ve experienced his salvation and you have relationship with this God. You know this God, you walk with this God, you worship this God, you love this God, you know him. And this is the way he speaks to his people.
Zephaniah 3:17 reminds us that the Lord rejoices over His people with gladness and joy.
The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save. He will rejoice over you with gladness. This is how God speaks to his people. He says, “I will rejoice over you with gladness. I will quiet you by my love. I will exalt over you with loud singing.” Oh God, we know you spoke these words specifically to your people through Zephaniah thousands of years ago. But we also so know that we are your sons and daughters through faith in Jesus.
All who’ve trusted in him and you have saved us and you’ve brought us into your family. And so God, I just pray these words over all of your people now that they would know in a fresh way right now, the depth of your love and your joy and your salvation. That they would know that you are in their midst. That you are with them right now. They are not alone right now, that you are within them. Your Holy Spirit dwells in them and you are a mighty one who saves. You’re a mighty one who delivers and you rejoice over your people with gladness.
God The Father
God may they see it. May they see you as a father who is glad over his children. Over them specifically. That you quiet your children, your people by your love. God, I pray that you would quiet people’s hearts, particularly those who are going through hard times right now, challenges right now in all kinds of different ways I can’t even imagine, but you know them all. I just pray God that you would quiet their hearts and their minds with your love. And I pray that they would know that you are a God who exalts over your people with loud singing, that you sing over us with joy over your children, over your people who you have saved.
God Loves Us
God, I’m stunned. I’m awed before you as I read these words and I think about your love for me that I don’t deserve and your love for every single person listening right now, who has trusted in you. And so God, I just pray maybe more than anything right now, based on Zephaniah 3:17, that you would draw every single person listening right now into deeper intimacy with you as father. If there’s anybody listening right now, who’s never put their trust in Jesus that this would be the day, this would be the moment.
Maybe even some who’ve lived out a cold, mundane, heartless Christianity, necessarily put it that way but the reality is that’s what it’s been. God, I pray it would soften their hearts that they might know you and love you. God for each of us, that you would draw us into deeper intimacy with you as our God. We pray these things in Jesus’ name who makes these realities possible for us. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
