In Malachi chapter 1, I've entitled
our lesson this morning, A Very Important Message. I gave it
that title because the prophecy that God gave Malachi will end
the Old Testament. And God will not speak again
for 400 years. 400 years after this, God's going
to be silent. There won't be another word from
God. There won't be another prophet in Israel. until John the Baptist. Now, if I knew that a message
that I was going to hear would be the last message that I would
hear for a long time, I hope I'd put a lot of importance into
listening to it, listening very carefully. In this prophecy of
Malachi, God has a very important message for his people. It's
a message of repentance. Turn to Christ. The last message
of the Old Testament is the first message that we hear when God
speaks again through John the Baptist. It's a message of repentance. Turn to Christ from your sin.
Now Malachi prophesied in Israel at the time after the Jews had
returned from their captivity in Babylon. The city had been
rebuilt, the temple had been rebuilt, and they had restored
all the activity in that temple. The scriptures were publicly
read every week. The sacrifices were offered.
All the different ceremonial days were observed. But all was
not well. All was not as it appeared. They
did have the right form and ceremony of their religion. But God says
he wasn't pleased with their religious activity because it
was not worship from the heart. People were going through the
motions, but they were indifferent in the heart. Now religion. Their religion. was not worship. All it had degenerated to, it
was a social gathering to be seen, it was just going through
the motions, because this is what we're supposed to do. The
people did draw an eye to God with their mouth, but their hearts
were far from Him. Their religion was just lip service.
They defiled the priesthood by compromising with idolatry all
around them. And whenever we do that, compromise
with idolatry, We don't just water down. We don't just slightly
change what we're doing to fit in with somebody else. We make
our religion idolatry. That's what they've done. God
wasn't pleased with that. The people were not giving. They
weren't tithing like they're supposed to, to support the priests.
They robbed God of what belonged to him. And they robbed God more
than just not giving what they're supposed to give. They love God
of the respect and the worship and the honor that he was due. Yet even in these horrible conditions,
God sends a prophet to his people and tells them that you repent
rather than destroy them. He sends them a prophet to tell
them that you turn to the Lord. And in this prophecy, he gives
us several reasons to turn to the Lord. And the first one is
this. You turn to the Lord because
of God's electing love for his people. Chapter one, verse one. The burden of the word of the
Lord to Israel by Malachi. I've loved you, saith the Lord,
yet you say wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's
brother, saith the Lord? Yet I loved Jacob, and I hated
Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the
dragons of the wilderness. Now scripture plainly teaches
God chose a people out of Adam's fallen race to love and to save. Now if God's love for sinners,
for his people, doesn't break your heart and cause you to turn
to the Lord, you've got a serious heart problem. God hadn't given
you a new heart yet. If his love for sinners doesn't
turn you to him, you just got Adam's dead heart of stone. But
you know, even believers sometimes find ourselves in a state of
spiritual stupor. We don't think just right. Israel
here asked the Lord, Well, you say you love us, but what good
has that done us? Now, they must have been looking
at their situation through eyes of the flesh and not faith. But
before we're too hard on them. Have you ever done that thought
the Lord loves me, what good is that doing me? See, they couldn't
see all God's blessings to. These people living at this time
had been delivered in their lifetime from bondage in Babylon. Didn't
they remember that? I mean, how ungrateful can you
be? Well, have we ever been that
way? Ungrateful for all God's blessings to us? And when we
feel like God's love hasn't helped us and we feel like God's love
not making a difference to me, not helping me in any way. I
promise you we're looking at things in the flesh, not the
spirit. I promise you. And the way the prophet corrects
the error in the attitude of the people is reminding them
of God's electing love. God loves the people that he
chose with an eternal, everlasting, unchanging love. And he said,
I love Jacob. I love you sons of Jacob. He
called believers sons of Jacob. Because every believer is a lot
like Jacob. We've got a depraved nature just
like Jacob had. We're cheap, just like Jacob
was. We've robbed both God and man,
we're cheap. Yet just like Jacob, God loved
us before we were born. He loved us when he chose us
in eternity past. And just like Jacob, God calls
us by his grace. He reveals himself to us. He
revealed himself to Jacob in a vision. He reveals himself
to his people today through the preaching of the word. And when
we get to the end of our life, just like Jacob, we'll say, God
shepherded me. all the days of my life. He's
provided for me, he's led me, he's guide me. God kept his promise
to me all the days of my life. We're sons of Jacob. And you
write this down. God always chooses the worst
to save. God said there are two brothers.
Before they were born, I chose one of them. I could have chosen
Esau, he says. And what he means is, is humanly
speaking, that had been a better choice. People liked Esau. He's a good guy. He's a man's
man. We like Esau. But God passed
him by. And more than simply passing
him by, more than simply not choosing him, God says, I hated
Esau. I love Jacob. And I hated Esau. And it's no wonder he hated Esau.
Esau's in the flesh. Esau's outside of Christ and
God hated him. And God said he made everything
that Esau ever did come to waste spiritually. Everything Esau
did came to waste because it was outside of Christ. Now, physically,
God blessed Esau greatly, didn't he? Oh, he blessed him tremendously. But you know, whenever he blessed
Esau physically, materially, it was always for Jacob's sake,
always. And God does the same thing today.
He blesses the most wicked men so they can give jobs to believers. They can give jobs to you. He
uses the things that He gives them for the good of His people.
He still does that today. And even though Jacob never did
one thing right, you can't find Jacob doing anything right. Yet
God blessed him in every way, didn't He? God blessed Jacob
spiritually in every way. You can't find a way Jacob wasn't
blessed. Well, the only thing that you
can attribute that to is God's electing love. And that eternal,
sovereign, electing love causes God's people to turn to him. We love him because he first
loved us. We turn to him because he first
loved us. Turn to the Lord because of his
electing love for his people. Second, turn to the Lord, because
you know it's only right to turn to God. Look at verse six of
chapter one. A son honoreth his father and
a servant his master. If then I be a father, where
is mine honor? And if I be a master, where is
my fear? Sayeth the Lord of hosts unto
you, O priest that despise my name. And you say, wherein have
we despised thy name? Now turn to the Lord, because
it's only right. And he uses two examples. He
uses the example of a child and the example of a servant. It's
only right that a child honors parent, a son honors his father.
That's only right. Now to those of you who are parents,
we've got some parents of young children here, let me tell you
something. You be the parent. Don't be their friend, you be
their parent. You be the one who's in charge. What you say goes. You be the
one who teaches and leads. And by example, you be the parent. But now listen to me. Don't just
demand that your child respect you. You just do what I say because
I say. Don't be this authoritarian.
Don't do that. You earn your child's respect.
You walk the walk. I'm telling you, you earn their
respect by being an honorable, loving parent. A child will see
through a hypocrite faster than anybody. And if you're a hypocrite,
you act something different here and you do at home, they're going
to see through it every time and they'll despise your religion.
They'll despise your God. Your greatest prayer for your
child ought to be that God save them by his grace. Don't you
give them a reason to hate him. Don't you give them a reason
to despise it. You be honorable. You earn their respect. It'll
be a whole lot easier for them and you. I'm telling you the
truth. It sure will. But a child ought to love and
respect their parents. Now, you ought to honor your
parents. It's just right. They give you life. They provide
for you. It's just right. It's the natural
order of things, isn't it? And it's only right that a servant
give respect to the boss. You know the old saying, he may
not always be right, but he's the boss. It's just right that
he should be respected. It's just a natural order of
things. We ought not need God to tell
us that in His Word. It's just natural order of things.
Well, if those things are true about men, how much more true
are they about Almighty God? God is our Father. He's our Creator. He's the one that gave us life.
He's the one that sustains our life. And I promise you this,
by his character, he has earned our respect. He ought to be respected. And God's our master. We ought
to bow to him. It's only right that we give
God the respect and the honor to his name. He's our master.
Now, if that doesn't break your heart, and give you a desire
to serve and honor the Lord. It's because God hadn't given
you a new heart. That's all there is to it. To God's people, you tell
them turn to the Lord because it's just right to honor God,
and they will. Third, turn to the Lord and worship
Him in Christ because everything else is pollution. Look at verse
seven. God says here to the priest,
you've despised my name. They said, where in have we despised
thy name? He said, well, you offer polluted bread upon mine
altar. And you say wherein if we polluted thee? In that you
say the table of the Lord's contemptible. And if you offer the blind for
sacrifice, is it not evil? And if you offer the lame and
sick, is it not evil? Offer it now unto thy governor.
Will he be pleased with thee or accept thy persons, saith
the Lord of hosts? Now what this is teaching us
is something very important. Coming to God. in any way, in
any person, in anything other than the perfect person and sacrifice
of the Lord Jesus Christ is pollution. That's what it is. I remember
these people, they had reestablished the right form, the right ceremony
of their religion. But if you look closely, you'd
see things are not right. You know what they were doing? They were offering polluted one
or two or three day old bread to God to bring to the table
of showbread. They make bread and eat it, whatever's
left over. It started getting stale and
they didn't want to eat it. That's what they go put on the table
of showbread. They put that before God. Now what that's teaching
us is trying to live spiritually off of anything other than Christ,
the bread of life, is trying to live off of maggot infested
bread. Christ is the bread of life.
And the father has given his people the bread of life. Now,
what a gift. What a gift. Now turn to him. That's what he's saying. And
the people, they were offering the sacrifices. They had the
form, you know, down right there bringing the sacrifices, bringing
the lamb, but it wasn't a spotless lamb. What they were sacrificing
to God was the sick and the blind lamb. They go out there and they
look at their flock. And they look at all those fine
lambs, and when they look at them, they see dollar signs.
I can sell that one at the market. I can do this, that, and that.
This one, this one's lame. He's got three legs. This one's
blind. I can't sell him at the market.
Can't get anything for him at the market. Tell you what I'm
going to do. That's the lamb I'm going to
take and offer. I'll give him. I'll give him to God. Offer him
as a sacrifice. Well, it's no wonder God's not
going to accept that sacrifice. What is that lamb? He's a picture
of Christ, the spotless lamb of God. God's not going to accept
any sacrifice that's not spotless. He tells them your governor is
not going to accept that as payment for your taxes. He's not going
to accept a lame lamb. He's not going to accept a blind
one. Well, certainly God's not going to accept him. Now, what
this is teaching us is this. Don't come to God. in any other
sacrifice other than the sacrifice of Christ, the Lamb of God. Trying
to come to God in your own words, trying to add something to the
sacrifice of Christ is the exact same thing as offering a three-legged
lamb to God or a blind lamb to God. He's not going to accept
it. But I tell you there's another lesson here on how to worship
and serve the Lord. What the people were doing is
they were offering to God what cost them nothing. Remember David
said maybe he wanted to buy that farm and the farmer said, you
take it. And David said, no, I won't do it. I'm gonna pay
the full price, not a penny less because I won't offer to God
what cost me nothing. Now we're not cleansed from our
sin. We're not accepted by God because of anything we do. We
know it's all in Christ. We know that, right? But this
is also true. God still deserves our best.
He deserves our very best. And if we offer to God what costs
us nothing, God won't accept it. If we offer to God only what's
left over, we take what we want and then whatever we don't want
or whatever's left over, and we offer that to God, God won't
accept it. He says here, the governor won't
accept that. You try doing that with the IRS. No, the IRS don't
take what's left over after you're done with it. They take first,
don't they? Before you get a chance to get
your mitts on it, just take it right out. Everybody, when they
first get a job, they're horrified. They look at their pay stub and
see what the IRS has gone in there and took out first. The
IRS is not going to accept that. Certainly, Almighty God won't.
You can't be surprised that He won't. So worship God with the
very best that you have. Give the best of your time to
worshiping God and serving Him. Don't let something else take
priority over worshiping God. Don't do it. Don't just worship
God and you don't got nothing else better to do. Clear your
schedule. So give God the best of your
time. Your money, give to God first. You have to support the gospel. Give out of a loving, grateful
heart God in the Old Testament always got the firstfruits. He
got the best part. Now, we're not under law. We're
under grace. If the law demands you give the
firstfruits to God, ought not grace compel your heart to give
Him the best, the firstfruits? Of course it will. And if we
don't give to God first, it's no wonder He's not going to bless
us, because He just deserved better than that. But now listen,
be sure, be sure of this, that you serve God out of a loving,
thankful heart, not because you're trying to get something from
God. You beg God for mercy and quit trying to earn God's favor.
That's what he says here in verse nine. He says, now I pray you,
beseech God, beg God that he'll be gracious unto us. This hath
been by your means. Will he regard your person as
saith the Lord of hosts? Who is there even among you that
would shut the doors for nought? Neither do you kindle fire on
my altar for nought. I have no pleasure in you, saith
the Lord opposed. Neither will I accept an offering
at your hand. Now what he's saying there is,
you won't even stay after the service and lock the doors unless
you're getting something for it. You won't even come in early
and start the fire in the altar for the sacrifices unless somebody's
giving you something for it. And God says, if that's your
motivation, if your motivation for staying after service and
locking the doors or coming before, you know, do something. If your
motivation is trying to get something from God for doing it, God said,
I won't accept it. If that's your motivation, don't
try to earn God's favor. Beg God for mercy. It's just
right that we do that. God is God and we're maggots.
It's just right that we worship and serve him. You can't do anything
for God. Can't do anything for Him. You
can't add anything to Him. Then beg God to do something
for you. And when He does, serve Him out
of a thankful heart. It's only right. Four. Here's the fourth reason to turn
to God. Turn to Christ. Because any preaching outside
of Christ is weariness. It's a weariness to you and it's
a weariness to God. You know, the last thing I want
to do is weary God. I want him to be pleased with
me. Well, if I want God to be pleased
with me, I've got to come to him in Christ. We've got to preach
Christ. We've got to turn to Christ.
Look at verse 13 of chapter one. You said also, behold, what a
weariness is it? Now that ought to tell you something,
you know, that they they're not worshiping God from the heart.
And they said, it's a weariness. It's a weariness to them. Think
what it is to God. Behold, what a weariness is it.
And you've snuffed at it, saith the Lord of hosts. And you brought
that which was torn and lame and the sick. Thus she brought
an offering. Shall I accept this of your hand,
saith the Lord? But curse be the deceiver, which
hath in his flock a male, and voweth and sacrificeth unto the
Lord a corrupt thing. For I'm a great king, saith the
Lord of hosts, and my name is dreadful among the heathen. You
see, when we try to come to God outside of Christ, when we try
to serve God with something other than Christ, when we try to serve
God out of something other than Christ, the perfect sacrifice,
God says, it's a weariness to me. He won't accept it. Well,
if the preaching of Christ and the worship of Christ is a weariness
to us, if it's a weariness to us, we just do it because that's
what we have to do, what we've always done. God's not going
to accept that. It's worship from the heart. Next, God says
it's a weariness to him if we compromise with false religion,
because it makes our worship idolatry. Look at chapter two,
verse 11. Judah hath dealt treacherously,
and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem. For
Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord, which he loved,
and hath married the daughter of a strange God. He's married
the daughter of a strange God. Look at verse 12. And the Lord
will cut off the man that doeth this, the master and the scholar,
out of the tabernacles of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering
unto the Lord of hosts. He's not going to accept that
offering because he's compromised with idolatry. He says here he's
married the daughter of a strange God. He's compromised with idolatry. He said, well, you know, we won't
say it quite this way, you know, we'll say in a way that people
don't really know what we mean so we can get along. Well, when
we do that, all we've done in that compromise has turned our
religion, our worship into idolatry. Now, they're still making a big
show of religion. Look at verse 13. And this have
you done again, covering the altar of the Lord with tears,
with weeping and with crying out. It is so much that he regardeth
not the offering any more, or receiveth it with good will at
your hand." So they're making a big show. Now they compromised
with the idolaters, but they're still making a big show of religion.
They're crying, they're covering the altar with tears, they're
making a big show of wailing and crying and waving arms around,
you know. But all that is, is a show of
the flesh. It's will worship and God says
it wearies me. Now look back at Isaiah chapter
1, I'll show you that. All that big show of the flesh,
God says, wearies him. He's not going to accept it.
Isaiah 1 verse 11. To what purpose is the multitude
of your sacrifices unto me, saith the Lord? I am full of the burnt
offerings of rams and the fat of fed bees, and I delight not
in the blood of bullocks or of lambs or of he-goats. When you
come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand
to tread my course? Bring no more vain oblation.
Incense is an abomination unto me, the new moons and Sabbaths
the calling of assemblies. I cannot. Away with. It is iniquity. Even your solemn meeting, your
new moons, and your appointed feasts, my soul hates. They're
a trouble unto me, I'm weary to bear them. And when you spread
forth your hands, when you make this big show of religion in
the flesh, I'll hide my eyes from you. Yea, when you make
many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood.
So any preaching, other than Christ alone, is weariness to
God. And he says, I won't accept it. So turn to Christ. Turn to God
through the preaching of the gospel of Christ. Then God says
anything other than Christ our righteousness is a weariness
to him. Back in our text, Malachi 2 verse
17. He says, you've wearied the Lord
with your words. Yet you say, when have we wearied
him? When you say, everyone that doeth evil is good in the sight
of the Lord, and he delighteth in them. Or when you say, where
is the God of judgment? Now, when you say that man's
doing anything about man, his, his deeds, his knowledge, whatever
he does, man's best. When you say that's good enough,
when you say what a man does is good enough to please God,
you just weary God. Saying that man's best is good
enough, saying that God won't judge you if you just do your
best. Where's the God of judgment? He's not going to judge you if
you just are sincere and do your best. If you do that, God will
accept you. That's a lie. It's such a lie. God says that's
calling evil good. God says you weary me when you
call man's evil works good. That's a weariness to God. And
saying that a sinner does not need Christ to be his righteousness,
I mean be all of his righteousness, but saying a sinner's got to
do something to make the sacrifice of Christ work for him, that's
a lie. God says that's calling good
evil. That's calling the righteousness
of Christ evil. Saying that a sinner has got
to do something other than simply trust Christ alone, for all of
his righteousness, is calling the righteousness of Christ evil. That's how serious this matter
is. Evil. And God says, I'm weary of it.
Now you hear, just through the TV or hearing people talk, you
hear that kind of preaching, that kind of doctrine, way too
often, don't you? Are you weary of it? I am sick
to death of it. Think how weary God is of it.
So what are we to do? Turn to Christ alone. If hearing
of the sacrifice of Christ, hearing that He made His people righteous
by taking their sins in His own body on the tree and putting
it away through the sacrifice of Himself, if that doesn't cause
you to turn to God and break your heart, then God hasn't given
you a new one yet. That's all there is to it. Now
here's the fifth thing, fifth reason to turn to God. Turn to
God because of God's eternal covenant of grace. And the picture
that God uses for this covenant of grace is the picture of marriage.
Look at chapter two, verse 14. Yet you say, wherefore? Why won't
you accept this with goodwill at my hand? Because the Lord
hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against
whom thou hast dealt treacherously. Yet is she thy companion and
the wife of thy covenant. You made a promise with her,
you've got a covenant with her. And did not he make one? Yet
had he the residue of the spirit, and wherefore one, that they
might seek a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit,
and let none deal treacherously against the wife of its youth.
For the Lord, the God of Israel, saith, he hateth putting away.
For one covereth violence with his garment, saith the Lord of
hosts. Therefore, take heed to your spirit, that you deal not
treacherously. Now, what this scripture and
many other scriptures plainly teach us is that divorce is wrong. Now, it happens. Divorce happens. God even gave a bill of divorce
in the law, didn't he? Now, that doesn't make divorce
right. God just gave that bill of divorce because of the hardness
of our heart. And the reason that all this, this picture of
marriage is so important is marriage is a picture of the covenant,
the eternal love between Christ and his bride. Christ and his
bride that he chose, that he betrothed himself to. Next month,
we're going to have two weddings here in this building. Those
couples, both of them, are going to take vows to each other and
they're going to take vows before God Almighty. To violate those
vows and end that marriage would be a violation of the picture
of the union between Christ and His bride. And that'll never
happen. Now, if you've been divorced,
you can't go back and change that. There's nothing to do about
it now. Let's see this teaching. The
teaching of marriage is the picture of redemption, the union between
Christ and his people. Marriages end for a variety of
reasons, and I thought of two that seem to be very, very prevalent.
The first one is abandonment. One of the parties just leaves,
and you can't do anything about that. But how awful to be that
abandoned spouse. I just think how awful would
it be? I come home and Jan's gone. All her clothes are gone,
everything, gone. Now you repent and you turn to
Christ. He will never abandon his bride,
never. And if the faithfulness of Christ
doesn't cause you to turn to him, something's wrong with you. I know what it is. You still
got Adam's heart. God hasn't given you a new one.
And the faithfulness of Christ. God's saving a man, saving a
sinner, saving a woman. That's going to have an effect
on us more than just Sundays and Wednesdays. It's going to
affect our daily life, our daily walk. The faithfulness of Christ
to his people ought to be a strong motivation for us to be faithful
to our spouse. God's going to be faithful to
His covenant. We'll look at that more in a few minutes in the
message. God will be faithful to His covenant. Turn to Him.
Then second is this. Marriage is end because the couple
says we're just not in love anymore. We've fallen out of love with
each other. Wouldn't that be awful to hear?
Dear, your spouse, you stood, I stood and took a vow 29 years
ago. And for me one day to tell Janet,
you know, I swore I'd love you. I swore I'd stay with you. And
for me to tell her I don't love you anymore. Well, I'm telling
you to repent and you turn to Christ. His love for His bride
never ends. Now here we're right back to
our first point, right back to where we began. The love of God
for His people. If His love for sinners, do you
deserve that love? Have you given back the kind
of love that you ought to give Him for loving you? No. Yet His
love never ends. Not only does it never end, it
never changes. It always stays perfect. If that
doesn't break your heart, and cause you to turn to the Lord,
God hasn't given you a new heart. Nothing will break that stony
heart of Adam's. If God's given you a new heart,
that breaks your heart and causes you to turn to Him. And that
ought to affect our daily walk. The love of Christ for His people
ought to be strong motivation for us to be a loving spouse.
If the love of Christ for sinners doesn't do it, nothing will. Love of Christ doesn't do it.
What is the lost cause? Nothing will. And God will cause
his people to turn to him. He'll give his people the gift
of repentance. I want to give you this very
quickly in closing. Malachi gives us some results
of God turning his people to Christ. Those who repent and
turn to Christ, they'll fear the Lord and they'll speak often
of him. Look in chapter three, verse
16. Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another,
and the Lord hearkened and heard it. And a book of remembrance
was written before them that feared the Lord and that thought
upon his name. They feared the Lord. They spake
often one to another. They spake of the Lord often,
not just in the services, but throughout their day. They see
each other out. You know, they have somebody
over their house. They sit down while they talk about it. They talk
about the Lord. They spoke about him often. Then
everyone who repents, they'll be healed of all their sin sicknesses. They'll be made righteous. Look
at chapter four, verse two. But unto you that fear my name,
shall the son of righteousness arise with healing in his wings.
And you should go forth and grow up as calves of the stall. Everyone
who repents, looks to Christ, comes to Christ, the son of righteousness
is gonna rise. You make them righteous. with
healing in his wings. He'll heal all their spiritual
sin sicknesses. By his stripes, we're healed. And then lastly, I'll tell you
when we'll turn to the Lord. When God sends us a preacher,
preaches Christ to us. Chapter 4, verse 5. Behold, I
will send you Elijah the prophet. Now that's John the Baptist.
I'll send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great
and dreadful day of the Lord. And when you hear him, when God
gives you ears to hear him, He'll turn, you'll repent. He shall
turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart
of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth
with the curse. God give us the grace to turn
to him. Very important message, isn't
it? All right, Lord bless you.