Jesus in Malachi: Passionately Pure
Malachi is the 39th book of the Bible and is the final book of the Old Testament. After Malachi we enter 400 years of silence from God until the voice of one crying in the wilderness declares, “Prepare the way of the Lord.”
The Old Testament closes with the word “curse” as an expression of God’s love to avoid this. The New Testament closes with blessing. “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.”
The context of Malachi is that the Jews had been back in the land for more than 100 years after having returned from Babylonian captivity. They were looking for the blessings they expected to receive when they returned.
Though the temple had been rebuilt, the fervor of those early returning Israelites gave way to apathy for those who followed. This led to corruption among the priesthood and a spiritual lethargy among the people. Jews are carrying out God’s directives for ritual service in this apathetic state. (Malachi 1:10; 3:10).
It is entirely possible to do the work of the Lord without being connected to the Lord of the work.
Malachi simply means “My [God’s] messenger.”
Jesus is revealed in Malachi as the God’s messenger of Truth bringing fire to burn away impurities.
Malachi 3:1-4 See, I will send my messenger…For he will be like a refiner’s fire... 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the Lord, as in days gone by, as in former years. (NIV)
Transformation is a process that takes time. Notice God sits as a refiner.
A silversmith will leave the silver over the fire and just watch it. He doesn’t stir it; he doesn’t move it away from the fire. He watches the silver until the moment he sees his image reflected on its surface, then he removes it from the flame.
God is devoted to his work being done in your life. He will complete His purpose, but it takes time, so God sits and watches us over the flame.
Phil 1:6 And I am sure that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on that day when Christ Jesus comes back again. (NLT)
When it seems that God isn’t working, or has forgotten about us, that is the time when we must trust in His unfailing love. Malachi began His message with a reminder of the eternal love of God, a love that is sovereign, strong, steadfast and seeking.
The people questioned God’s perspective repeatedly, showing a disconnect between their perspective and God’s.
1. Malachi 1:2: How have you loved us?’
2. Malachi 1:6: How have we shown contempt for your name?
3. Malachi 1:7: How have we defiled you?
4. Malachi 2:17: How have we wearied him?”
5. Malachi 3:7: “How are we to return?”
6. Malachi 3:8: “How have we robbed you?”
7. Malachi 3:13: “What have we said against you?”
8. Malachi 3:14: “You have said, ‘It is futile to serve God. What do we gain by (obedience)
Malachi revealed how God would refine so the offerings and sacrifices will be acceptable to the Lord. It is entirely possible to offer sacrifices to God with a disconnected and distracted heart.
When passion is reduced to a willingness to do WHAT we've been told we should do without stirring up WHY, desire slowly dies. The Book of Revelation reveals this in the church of the last days.
Rev 3:1 …I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. NIV
You were never created to live out a life that you could live without God’s help. (This is the idea of faith) Faith makes things possible not easy. We must stop believing for easy and get into a fighting frame of mind! A life you can live without him is not the life He’s called you to live.
GP4RL:
Turn the page every day this week. Don’t just read the book. Sit with the Author.
DISCUSSION GUIDE FOR COMMUNITY GROUP LEADERS
Click here for a downloadable pdf file of the guide.
Icebreaker: What do you say is the secret to a good life?
Remember the Book of Malachi was written to the Jews who were going through the motions of worship but lacking the heart behind it.
Malachi 1:10 “Oh that there were one among you who would shut the gates, that you might not uselessly kindle fire on My altar! I am not pleased with you,” says the LORD of hosts, “nor will I accept an offering from you. NAS
It is entirely possible to do the work of the Lord without being connected to the Lord of the work.
Discussion:
• Share an experience when you were striving to do the work of the Lord without being
connected to the Lord of the work.
• Now share how God has drawn you into a deeper relationship with Him.
Jesus is revealed in Malachi as the God’s messenger of Truth bringing fire to burn away impurities.
Malachi 3:1-4 See, I will send my messenger…For he will be like a refiner’s fire... 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the Lord, as in days gone by, as in former years. (NIV)
Transformation is a process that takes time and God is described in this text as one who sits as a refiner. God is devoted to his work being done in your life. He will complete His purpose, but it takes time, so God sits and watches us over various difficulties we walk through.
Phil 1:6 And I am sure that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on that day when Christ Jesus comes back again. (NLT)
When it seems that God isn’t working, or has forgotten about us, that is the time when we must trust in His unfailing love.
Discussion:
• Share a time when you walked through difficulty and God later showed up in your situation.
Malachi says God refines us so the sacrifices we make and the offerings we give will be acceptable to the Lord. It is entirely possible to be half-heartedly seeking God.
Rev 3:1 …I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. NIV
Discussion:
• How do you keep your faith in God and relationship with him alive?
Remember you were never created to live out a life that you could live without God’s help.
GP4RL: Turn the page every day this week. Don’t just read the book. Sit with the Author. Encourage and challenge one another in your group to do this and report back next week on how you did.
GOING DEEPER:
Malachi's prophecies do not stand at the end; but he was the last of the Old Testament prophets, and after him there were 'four centuries of silence.'
At the time of Malachi, well over a thousand years after Abraham’s era, the Israelites had the advantage and weight of history on their side; they could see the shining rewards of faithfulness and the punishments associated with judgment, even to the point of being uprooted from their land. But even then, with all that perspective, the book of Malachi teaches us that they still strayed from the Lord’s path. They needed God’s intervention as much as ever, so this book, as a final statement of judgment in the Old Testament, anticipates God’s saving work through the Messiah, Jesus Christ.
The people of Judah began to be exiled from the Promised Land in 605 BC, returning from Babylon seventy years later. By the time of Malachi, they had been back in the land for more than a hundred years and were looking for the blessings they expected to receive when they returned. Though the temple had been rebuilt, the fervor of those early returning Israelites gave way to a thorough apathy for the things of God. This led to rampant corruption among the priesthood and a spiritual lethargy among the people.
Malachi came along at a time when the people were struggling to believe that God loved them (Malachi 1:2). The people focused on their unfortunate circumstances and refused to account for their own sinful deeds. So God pointed the finger back at them, and through Malachi, God told the people where they had fallen short of their covenant with Him. If they hoped to see changes, they needed to take responsibility for their own actions and serve God faithfully according to the promise their fathers had made to God on Mount Sinai all those years before.
Throughout Israel’s history, the nation failed and God called His people back to Himself. Each time, Israel would fail again, prompting the cycle to begin again. God’s final word of the Old Testament concerns judgment for sin and testifies to our inability to love Him without the help of His grace.
Do you struggle to follow God consistently? Malachi’s call prompts us to live faithfully before God and offers hope that God is not yet through with extending mercy to His people.
Malachi is later than Haggai and Zechariah. In those books the rebuilding of the temple is the central concern. We know from Malachi 1:7 and Mal. 3:10 that not only had the temple been finished in Malachi’s day, but it had been in use for some time, and sin was corrupting the worship that took place in it.
The Message Bible Introduction To Malachi
Most of life is not lived in crisis-which is a good thing. Not many of us would be able to sustain a life of perpetual pain or loss or; ecstasy or challenge. But crisis has this to say for it: In time of crisis, everything, absolutely everything, is important and significant. Life itself is on the line. No word is casual, no action marginal. And almost always, God and our relationship with God is on the front page.
But during the humdrum times, when things are, as we tend to say, "normal," our interest in God is crowded to the margins of our lives and we become preoccupied with ourselves. "Religion" during such times is trivialized into asking "God-questions" - calling God into question or complaining about him; treating the worship of God as a mere hobby or diversion, managing our personal affairs (such as marriage) for our own convenience and disregarding what God has to say about them, going about our usual activities as if God were not involved in such dailiness.
The prophecy of Malachi is made to order for just such conditions. Malachi creates a crisis at a time when we are unaware of crisis. He wakes us up to the crisis of God during the times when the only thing we are concerned with is us. He keeps us on our toes, listening for God, waiting in anticipation for God, ready to respond to God, who is always coming to us.
Malachi gets in the last word of Holy Scripture in the Old Testament. The final sentences in his message to us evoke the gigantic figures of Moses and Elijah - Moses to keep us rooted in what God has done and said in the past, Elijah to keep us alert to what God will do in the days ahead. By leaving us in the company of mighty Moses and fiery Elijah, Malachi considerably reduces the danger of our trivializing matters of God and the soul.