Obadiah

The prophesy of Obadiah makes up the shortest of all the OT books. In one chapter of twenty-one verses, the prophet sums up the message given to him by God. As always, OT prophesy has an already/not yet application — the text was given to Obadiah for the people of his time, in the context of historical events. In addition, Obadiah’s prophesy applies to a future which has not yet come to pass.

This chart gives us a visual overview of the historical context of Obadiah’s prophesy. What do you notice about the time and place for Obadiah’s ministry? To whom was he speaking? About who and what was he speaking? For what purposes? What message did he share?

For more information about the historical context of Obadiah, let’s watch these two videos. What details do the videos help us to understand about the prophet and his time? What is the main theme of the book?

Now, let’s take a look at this chart from Charles Swindoll. What are the main sections of the book? What themes are developed in each section? What do we learn about Jesus in this book?

Next, let’s use our handout to study the text of this wonderful short book! Click here for the handout and questions. Click here to download the handout.

After the study, watch this video to pull all we have learned together. What do you know now that you didn’t know before? How has this study helped you grow in Christ? What more would you like to know? Look below, after the video, for more resources on Obadiah for further study on your own. Lastly, the clever picture that was drawn in the last video is at the bottom of this page; you can download it for your own use with permission from the good people at The Bible Project.