But upon mount Zion shall there be deliverance, and it shall be holy; and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions.
Obadiah's short prophecy has been one long announcement of judgment on Edom. Here the tone breaks: against the mountain of Esau stands Mount Zion, with escape, holiness and land given back.
One commentator sets Edom's past troubles beside a far worse one still to come on its own mountain, Seir. He draws a lesson from it too: judge nothing by how it begins.
But we may separate two things. The nations inflicted the past troubles of Edom. This brief prophecy seems to mark out a still more terrible trouble in the future. Then Israel as a whole will leave mount Seir more desolate than ever, because of the insult Edom did to the sons of Zion, whom God will then save and bless. So it is written here, "Upon mount Zion shall be deliverance." It is not the beginning that decides a war, but the end. And this is a serious thought for us to keep in view in all our ways.
These writers quote an older translation, which reads "deliverance" where the ESV has "those who escape." Zion's rescue and Esau's ruin are one event, not two.
Obadiah aims his whole short prophecy at Esau, and he makes it plain that just when "upon mount Zion shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness; and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions," the house of Esau "shall be for stubble," which gives us the same thought of unsparing judgment under a different figure.
Zion is not chosen at random. It stands for the way God acts after everything committed to human hands has broken down. Hebrews also puts Christians there already.
Mount Zion sets before us the great principle of sovereign grace. God will act on that principle in blessing for the earth when the day for it arrives. It is the spot on which He set His choice (Ps. 132:13) when everything committed to the hands of men had broken down. It speaks of Christ, risen from among the dead, the One in whom all God's purposes of blessing for men are made good. We Christians have already come there, as Heb. 12:22 tells us. So we get the benefit of the two things Obadiah connects with the literal Mount Zion: deliverance and rule.
The verse puts three things in a row: rescue, holiness, and land held. One writer ties them to God's promise about the remnant.
The final section of Obadiah's brief prophecy concerns the kingdom, the victory over the enemies and the restoration of His people. Mount Zion will come into its own; there will be deliverance and there will be holiness. What God had promised concerning the remnant of His people will come true. They will be a holy people. Then they will hold their possessions — all that the Lord in His infinite grace had promised to them.
"Possess their possessions" has a literal edge. The verses right after this name actual districts, and commentators warn against thinning that down into imagery.
These verses, like others in the prophets, look at the bright future for the earth. They show the earthly people once more restored and united in their land… Scripture names the places one by one. That shows we should not fritter it away by what people call spiritualising… In these matters true spirituality means understanding the word of God in the sense He intended. We may apply the principle of scripture, and this may be quite right.
Kelly allows that we may apply the principle of scripture. One writer does that with this phrase, and finds a gap between holding a title and living in the good of it.
There is a statement in Obadiah that the house of Jacob will yet "possess their possessions" (v. 17). Now is the time for us to possess our possessions. It is one thing to have title to all these blessings, quite another to have them as light in our souls.
Deliverance works the same way now: freedom from the grip of the world.
We enjoy deliverance from the power of the world and earthly things as the soul grows settled in what Zion stands for. It becomes real when we knowingly take our place on the ground of God's purpose, and see how everything finds its foundation and centre in Christ.
- Grace chooses the ground. God set His choice on Zion after everything trusted to human hands had broken down. Deliverance rests on His choice and on Christ risen.
- Grace delivers. The rescue lands on Zion at the very moment Esau becomes stubble. The end decides a war, not the start.
- Grace makes holy. The same mountain that shelters those who escape makes them a holy people. God promises deliverance and holiness in one breath.
- Grace hands back the land. The next verses name real districts. The promise means real land for a real people, not a picture to explain away.
- Grace can be lived in now. Hebrews says Christians have already come to Zion. So hold the blessings as light in the soul, not just as a title on paper.
And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble; and they shall kindle in them and devour them; and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau for Jehovah hath spoken [it].
Obadiah's short prophecy ends with a complete reversal. The people who suffered violence become the fire. The proud nation that watched them fall becomes dry stubble. Two questions follow. Is this a picture of the church and the gospel, or of a real future for Israel on earth? And why does Edom alone face a judgment that leaves nothing behind?
Many read this verse as a picture of the gospel spreading through the world. Kelly rejects that reading and holds to the plain sense of fire and stubble.
In verse 17 Obadiah speaks of a deliverance that comes from God, but comes on earth. It is the restoration of Israel, not of the church. The Spirit means Mount Zion literally, just as He later means the mountain of Esau, the plain of the Philistines, and the fields of Ephraim and Samaria. The pictures of fire and flame burning others up like stubble stand for judgment, not for grace. They belong to the day when the kingdom of our Lord over the world has come. People, and even believers, may doubt. But "the LORD has spoken."
So Israel does the burning. Darby explains whose hand Israel is in, and when this judgment comes.
Finally, Israel itself will be an instrument in the LORD's hand for the judgment of Esau (Obadiah 18)... The part Israel takes in the judgment falls on the people as a whole. I think it comes later, when Christ is at their head as the Messiah (compare v. 17, 18). Isaiah 11:14 seems to confirm this view of the passage. In any case, it takes place after Israel's blessing.
The order matters. Blessing comes first, then the fire. Israel does not earn restoration by beating Edom. God restores Israel first, and the judgment follows.
Why two houses and not one? Kelly says these two names are the sticking point for anyone who treats Israel's hope as finished.
This is in no way the gospel. It is the kingdom, when the two will be kept apart instead of running together as they do now in Christianity. The words that follow make this even plainer. It is absurd to apply them to the church, and both ignorance and error to explain them away. Scholars work in vain to explain how a remnant of Judah can be called "the house of Jacob" and "the house of Joseph." This difficulty comes only from a false system, one that exaggerates the past, points at the future, and robs God's ancient people of their hope.
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God judges other hostile nations, yet leaves survivors among them. Edom's case stands alone.
Of all the nations that come back into view for judgment at the time of the end, Edom is the only one with no "remnant" kept alive. God will judge the Edomites without mercy because of the way they treated His people. They were the most wicked of all, and the most eager to destroy Israel. Had they not once "refused to give Israel passage through his territory" on the way into the land of Canaan (Num. 20:21)?... So at the time of the end this terrible word of the Lord will come true: "Esau I have hated" (Mal. 1:3). For, as Obadiah says, "the LORD has spoken."
Edom's crime was not distance but nearness. Edom and Israel were brother nations, and Obadiah presses that bond.
This trait, already hinted at in the quotation from Psalm 83, was a bitter hatred of God's people. Obadiah names "your violence against your brother Jacob" as the special reason why Edom will be covered with shame and cut off for ever. God will spare a remnant from Egypt, Assyria and other nations to enjoy the blessing of Christ's rule, but "there shall be no survivor for the house of Esau" (ver. 18).
Esau is more than a hostile neighbour. Vine sees in him a picture of what Scripture calls the flesh.
Esau was a nearer relative to Jacob than Moab and Ammon were. In him we see a picture of the profane character of the flesh. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God in any way. True believers now are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit.
- Spoken — the verse rests on its last line: "for the LORD has spoken." People may doubt it, but the sentence is settled.
- Blessed — deliverance on Zion comes first. Israel becomes fire only after God has restored and blessed His people.
- United — "Jacob" and "Joseph" mean more than a remnant of Judah. God's promise reaches the whole people, in real places with real names.
- Consumed — every other nation keeps a remnant. Edom keeps none, because it turned violence on its own brother.
- Warned — Esau pictures the flesh: close to the blessing, profane toward it, left with nothing. Believers now live in the Spirit.