Frederick Nietzsche, the nineteenth century German philosopher, stated, “If they want me to believe in their God, they’ll have to sing me better songs . . . I could only believe in a God who dances.”(1) Our view of God determines our relationship with Him. Many individuals see the Lord as someone who stands off in the distance, watching and waiting to strike us down the minute we mess up. He is viewed as a God of rules and regulations, looking to stifle our fun and suppress our freedom; and to some people He is not a God to be desired. Would Nietzsche’s life have been different had he realized that the Lord cares for His creation?
The Bible teaches that the Lord is not impersonal, and He does not wish to remain somewhere in the distance; but rather, He desires a close and intimate relationship with human beings. In fact, for those of us who confess Him as Lord and Savior, He is a God who loves us so greatly and is filled with such joy for us, that He sings and dances over us! If only Nietzsche could have realized that God does sing beautiful songs, and that He really is a God who dances! This morning, we are going to come to know the Lord’s extravagant love, as we look at our God who sings and dances over us.
The Mighty One Will Save (Zephaniah 3:14-17)
14 Sing, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O Israel! Be glad and rejoice with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! 15 The Lord has taken away your judgments; He has cast out your enemy. The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall see disaster no more. 16 In that day it shall be said to Jerusalem: “Do not fear; Zion, let not your hands be weak. 17 The Lord your God in your midst, the Mighty One, will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing.”
Not too long ago, I was scanning through the Minor Prophets as I was researching a message on the prophecies of the Messiah, and this particular passage caused me to pause and ponder its meaning. I believe this passage caught my attention, because it had already been made familiar to me through the lyrics of a song entitled “Amazed,” by singer and songwriter Jared Anderson. The lyrics of this song declare, “You dance over me while I am unaware. You sing all around, but I never hear the sound . . . Lord I’m amazed by You – how You love me.” These beautiful words have made melody in my heart for many years, and to stumble upon them in the Scripture was an awesome surprise.
So, what is going on here in this passage? What brought about this incredible revelation of how God sings over Israel; and in today’s application, how He sings over those who are His? Exactly what had Israel experienced that resulted in God lavishing His mercy and extravagant love upon His people?
First of all, in verse 14, we see that God was speaking to Zion, Israel, and Jerusalem. Zion here is “the city of David,” where King David built a citadel and his palace, and it was the place where the Ark of the Covenant had been stored for some time before being brought into the temple that King Solomon had built. “In the later books of the Old Testament this name was sometimes used to denote Jerusalem in general, and sometimes God’s chosen Israel.”(2) “In the New Testament it is used sometimes to denote the Church of God,”(3) meaning, those who worship Jesus Christ. The three names mentioned here (Zion, Israel, and Jerusalem) are all names for God’s chosen people or those who worship the Lord; and Zion includes those of us who worship Him today.
If we examine this passage in its context we understand that God was speaking to Israel; and in verse 15, we learn that God wanted to remove the judgment that was brought on Israel by her enemy. What judgment and what enemy was the Lord referring to? Zephaniah lived from 641-610 B.C. in the days of King Josiah, king of Judah, and he was prophesying of future judgment on Israel by Babylon that would occur around 587 B.C.(4) The enemy mentioned in this passage was Babylon, and the judgment was where the people were carried away captive into Babylon as punishment for abandoning the Lord and worshiping foreign gods. Keep in mind that this would all occur in the future; nevertheless, it would take place, and Israel would come to yearn for God’s deliverance.
Zephaniah prophesied of judgment by Babylon, but he also prophesied of the day of deliverance from that judgment. In verse 16, he used the expression “in that day” which is in the future tense, and is an image of God’s faithfulness to His people and a future deliverance. The people were told, “Let not your hands be weak” (v. 16). In Hebrews chapter twelve, we read about how the Lord allows us to go through hard times for our own good; and in Hebrews 12:12, we are encouraged to “strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees.” Israel would experience chastening during the Babylonian exile, but chastening lasts only for a time before we are purged and escape to the other side; therefore, we are to lift up our heads and take heart, and stand tall in the confidence that our deliverance is near.
Isaiah 35:3-6 refers to deliverance by the coming Messiah, and Israel is encouraged, “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are fearful-hearted, ‘Be strong, do not fear! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God; He will come and save you.’ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing. For waters shall burst forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert.” Israel would go through a tough time during the captivity; and some of us are going through a difficult time in our lives today; but we are expected to look up and place our hope in our Deliverer, Jesus Christ.
The Bridegroom’s Amazing Love
In verse 17, we see God’s love for Israel, as it is His fervent desire to rescue Israel, swoop her off her feet and rapture her away to a place where He can “rejoice over [her],” “quiet [her] with His love,” and “rejoice over [her] with singing.” Matthew Henry tells us that this takes place “as the bridegroom does [with] his bride.”(5) What we have here is wedding imagery, and a beautiful picture of the bridegroom waiting to steal his bride away.
In Isaiah 62:5, we read in reference to Israel, “As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall your God rejoice over you.” Israel was viewed as God’s bride; however, the Lord declared in Jeremiah 2:32, “Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? Yet My people have forgotten Me days without number.” The bride had run away from the bridegroom and played the harlot (Hosea 2:1-4); however, as we see demonstrated in the book of Hosea, the bridegroom pursues her with an undying love, which is a picture of God’s pursuit of Israel.
Today, those who know Jesus as Lord and Savior – the church, or Zion – are seen as the bride of Christ (Revelation 21:2, 9-10), and Jesus is called the bridegroom (John 3:29); and similar to Israel, people today are running from God and doing their own thing. What we need to understand from this passage is that the Lord loves us and pursues us, and when He finds us there is a great deal of rejoicing in heaven (Luke 15:4-10), for the bride of Christ is being restored.
The Lord Sings over His People
In verse 17, we see that God desired to “rejoice” over Israel, and “sing” over her as well. In just a moment I will discuss how He rejoices over Israel, but let’s first focus on how He will sing over her. What type of song will the Lord sing? In Psalm 32:5 and 7 we read, “I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,’ and You forgave the iniquity of my sin . . . You are my hiding place; you shall preserve me from trouble; you shall surround me with songs of deliverance.” We read here how the Mighty One desired to “save” Israel (v. 17) and rescue her; therefore, His songs would be “songs of deliverance” (Psalm 32:7); and in verse 17, we are told that God wanted to take away Israel’s judgments.
Today we are placed under God’s judgment if our sins have not been washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ. In Romans 6:23 we are told, “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” If we wish to receive forgiveness and eternal life, then we need to be as King David and confess our sins to the Lord (Psalm 32:5). 1 John 1:9 tells us, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” God will take away our judgments, as we read in Zephaniah 3:15, whenever we acknowledge and confess our sin. That’s when we are surrounded by His songs of deliverance.
The Bridegroom Makes Us Beautiful
We are forgiven of our sins because Jesus Christ, the bridegroom, died for our sins. The wages of sin is spiritual death (Romans 6:23) in the flames of hell for all eternity; however, Jesus took our place in death. He received the punishment for our sins, and took them on Himself, when He died on the cross; and the Bible teaches us that all we have to do in order to receive Jesus’ gift of eternal spiritual life is to believe in our heart that He died for us, and believe that He rose again from the grave victorious over sin and death (Romans 10:9-10).
Ephesians 5:25-27 states, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word, that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.” The bridegroom, Jesus Christ, loved us so much that He died for us on the cross that we might be purified from our guilty stains and be presented unto Christ as spotless and free of sin on that great wedding ceremony in heaven in that final Day.
If we know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, then in that Day when we stand before the Lord in heaven, the Lord will not see any blemishes; but instead, He will see a beautiful “bride adorned for her husband” (Revelation 21:2). The bridegroom is longing to sweep us off our feet and sing us sweet songs of deliverance. He is even willing to die for us, and I encourage you this morning to listen to His voice as He is calling out for you.
The Lord Dances over His People
The Lord not only wanted to sing over Israel with songs of deliverance, but He longed to rejoice over her as well. I mentioned earlier how singer Jared Anderson said that God dances over us. The Hebrew word for “rejoice” which we find here, or yagil (giyl, gheel), is defined in Strong’s Concordance as, “To spin around under the influence of any violent emotion,” and to “be glad, be joyful,” or to “rejoice, cry out, and exalt.”(6) One commentary states, “Yagil literally means ‘spin around in joy.’ God will spin around in joy over His people, and we reflexively respond to His love by spinning around also. Interestingly, rejoice and dance are the same word in Aramaic, the common language spoken in the area.”(7)
I did a search in multiple Bible translations in order to see if any of them actually rendered these verses in this manner, and only one did – the Jerusalem Bible. Zephaniah 3:17-18, in the Jerusalem Bible, tells us, “Yahweh your God is there with you, the warrior savior. He will rejoice over you with happy song, He will renew you by His love, He will dance with shouts of joy for you, as on a day of festival.”(8) Once again we see the picture of a bridegroom united with his bride, for in this day and time a wedding procession was “accompanied by singing, music and dancing” (Maccabees 9:39).(9) Our Bridegroom and Redeemer wants to express His joy at our deliverance by lavishing His love on us through singing and dancing; and the entire wedding party rejoices with Him (Luke 15:8-10).
Time of Reflection
As I stated at the beginning of our message many people, including Frederick Nietzsche, have a distorted perception of God; for they see Him as impersonal and judgmental, not a God to be desired. I also said that our view of God determines our relationship with Him. This morning we have seen that our God is passionately in love with us, and He wants us to return to Him from where we have gone astray in sin. If we fail to return to Him then He is a God of judgment; but if we run to Him, He is ready to bestow His unlimited mercy, compassion, and forgiveness, and He will rejoice over us with singing and dancing.
Our God truly sings beautiful songs – songs of deliverance; and He really is a God who dances – who dances for joy out of His love for us! You can know this God who sings and dances if you choose to have your sins forgiven by Jesus Christ; therefore, I encourage you to come and meet the bridegroom!
NOTES
(1) Taken from the Internet in January of 2007 at http://maggidawn.typepad.com/maggi dawn/2005/02/a_god_who_dance.html.
(2) M. G. Easton, “Zion,” Easton’s Bible Dictionary (Oak Harbor, WA: 1996), taken from Logos 2.1E on CD-ROM.
(3) Ibid.
(4) “Zephaniah,” Easton’s Bible Dictionary.
(5) Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Bible (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1997), taken from Logos 2.1 E on CD-ROM.
(6) “Dance,” taken from the Internet in January of 2007 at http://www.watchmanministries. org / worship/dance_word_study.htm.
(7) New Jerusalem Dancers, taken from the Internet in January of 2007 at http://www.angel fire.com/ia/njd/david.html.
(8) “Be Still and God May Dance for You,” taken from the Internet in January of 2007 at http://secondat.blogspot.com/2006/12/be-still-and-god-may-dance-for-you.html.
(9) “Marriage,” The New Bible Dictionary (Wheaton, Illinois: Tyndale House, 1962), taken from Logos 2.1E on CD-ROM.
