Three types of relationships:
- Believer to God (in the sanctuary).
- Believer to believer (in the land).
- Believers to unbelievers (in the world).
Key themes in Obadiah – what the book is about:
- The Lord Jesus Christ – God’s true humiliated and vindicated.
- Our spiritual fathers – how they suffered and how God relieved and vindicated them.
- The Justice of God.
- The spreading of the Gospel.
- The particular wickedness of those who were close to the people of God, yet persecuted them.
- How the Second Commandment can be broken in the sin of neutrality.
- Indifference to the suffering of others.
- Envy, malice and boasting.
- Where family feuds, grudges and the profane spirit (living for the here and now) lead.
- Refuges outside of the true God will always let you down.
- God is sovereign over the nations.
- God intervenes in history to punish wicked nations.
- Gives us a picture of what a world set straight looks like.
- God uses individuals and nations as instruments of His purposes.
- Hurting God’s people is a very dangerous and stupid thing to do.
- God keeps His promises to protect His people and to bless the world through them.
- Shows us that the persecuted people of God are to be confident in His care for them even though they may feel neglected and hopeless.