Great

The great day of the Lord is near,

    near and hastening fast. ~ Zephaniah 1:14a

What is the prophet talking about here? Afterall, "great" has many meanings: substantial, significant, large, imposing, absolute, impressive, awe-inspiring, magnificent, total, utter, dominant, peerless, formidable...

That's just the beginning of the list when you google synonyms for "great!"

What seems to be so "great" and significant is that this line comes in the center of a text about all of the wrath and destruction God says is coming as a result of some very human behaviors.

Complacency.  Ambivalence. Self-satisfaction. Apathy

In the passage, God reveals the "fire of God's passion" as an answer to a people who seem to be displaying no passion at all.

Now, there are certainly lots of ways to read this, and many of them might sounds an awful lot like: "you'd better start caring about God more, or the wrath of God is coming to come down on you."

That might have been what Zephaniah meant for his hearers, but I'm not sure its as helpful for us.

Instead I think maybe another way to see it is that God has pretty strong feelings about God's people.  About us.  About our neighbors.  About creation. 

God in fact is passionate about these things.

What would it be like if we were all just as passionate about them?

Pretty great, probably...

Great and passionate God, ignite our hearts to love this world and all its creation and creatures just as fervently as you do.  Amen.