The Day of Wrath

Zephaniah didn't give it soft edges.

The day he saw had seven names.

Seven different faces of the same terrible thing.

A day of wrath.

A day of trouble and distress.

A day of wasteness and desolation.

A day of darkness and gloominess.

A day of clouds and thick darkness.

A day of the trumpet and alarm.

Against the fenced cities, and against the high towers.

Not the vulnerable. Not the weak cities without walls.

The fenced cities. The fortified. The ones that had been built with the assumption of security.

And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the LORD.

Their blood shall be poured out as dust.

Their flesh as the dung.

Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD's wrath.

The two things that had always bought exit — silver and gold — unable to buy it.

The whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy.

For he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.

Speedy.

After all the patience. After all the waiting. After the prophets and the warnings and the long years of mercy —

Speedy.

The mighty men shall cry there bitterly.

Not the weak. The mighty.

The ones who had always had answers. Resources. Plans.

Crying bitterly. Because the day of wrath had arrived and none of their tools applied to it.

But Zephaniah did not end in darkness.

Seek ye the LORD, all ye meek of the earth.

Seek righteousness. Seek meekness.

It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the LORD's anger.

May be.

Even at the last hour.

Even before the day arrives.

The door was still open.

It may be.

Those two words were the last mercy Zephaniah offered before the darkness fell.

And they were enough.

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