Malachi: God has the last word

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Transcript

Celebrating 400 Episodes

SPEAKER_00 0:11

This is the Out Loud Bible Project Podcast, and I am Mike, and we get to celebrate a couple fun moments here on this episode. This is the 400th episode of the podcast. So of course, thank you so much. If you have listened to now 400 episodes of this podcast, thank you so much. That is quite the accomplishment, and uh it's been quite the journey. I'm so thankful that you've joined me on this. Now, maybe you haven't listened to all 400. You just jumped in somewhere and kept on going, and now you're here. And man, thank you so much. Thank you for your support of this podcast. And I've glad I'm so glad that you've been able to make this a part of the way that you engage with the Bible. And I hope you've seen a lot of growth in that. That's great. I'm also thankful for um those who have supported this podcast financially and uh supported the ministry of Outlawed Bible through our website. And uh, and that's a a big encouragement that uh that you know, we're gonna keep going. We're gonna, as long as there are people who still need to hear and understand and fall in love with and live out the word of God, then we're gonna keep doing this. I think we're gonna be busy until Jesus comes back. And uh happy to continue in this way. This is great. But not only is it the 400th episode, we actually get to start a new book of the Bible, which I always think is a lot of fun when we start a new book here on the podcast. And we're starting the book of Malachi, which consequently is also the last book of the Old Testament. So we get to conclude our read through of the books of the Old Testament today, all in one, one episode, four chapters, pretty quick and easy. It'll be fun. Uh, we're gonna read and conclude Malachi today. Now, uh, which really means that we've already read a lot of the New Testament. What we have coming up ahead is just one more season of this run-through of the Bible on this podcast. Now, when we conclude all of the read-throughs of the books, we will jump right back in and start again in another way, and it'll be it'll be fun. We'll we'll go through it a little bit differently than we did the first time around. But we are concluding this season of the podcast about homecoming, where we've taken the books of the Old Testament that chronicle the homecoming of the Jews after their exile. They had disobeyed God, and so God had punished them and sent them away to be captured and to live in other nations and other countries that were not their own for 70 years. And when they started coming back, then they got to re-establish themselves in the promised land. And Zerubbabel led a team, and Ezra led a team, and Nehemiah led a team, and they were accompanied by prophets who kept warning them, like, hey, you know, we're we're here, but we we gotta not go back to the way things used to be. And well, we find out today as we read Malachi how things turned out. If you remember the end of the book of Nehemiah, Nehemiah had to come back to Jerusalem, and he found that things had just drifted, and they had already begun to disobey the law of God, which they promised they would keep. And if Nehemiah came back just a few years after to find this, just imagine what Malachi found out. Malachi came into the scene here about a hundred years after this, and so the people who were living in the land were very well established at this point. And Malachi just has some final words of God before things go dark. Let's read how the Old Testament concludes here in the book of Malachi, chapters one through four, that's the whole book in the New English Translation. This is an oracle, the Lord's message to Israel through Malachi. I have shown love to you, says the Lord. But you say, How have you shown love to us? Esau was Jacob's brother, the Lord explains, yet I chose Jacob and rejected Esau. I turned Esau's mountains into a deserted wasteland and gave his territory to the wild jackals. Edom says, Oh, though we're devastated, we'll once again build the ruined places. So the Lord of Heaven's armies responds, They indeed may build, but I will overthrow. They'll be known as the land of evil, the people with whom the Lord is permanently displeased. Your eyes will see it, and then you'll say, May the Lord be magnified even beyond the border of Israel. A son naturally honors his father, and a slave respects his master. If I am your father, where's my honor? If I'm your master, where's my respect? The Lord of Heaven's armies asks you this, you priests who make light of my name. But you reply, Well, how have we made light of your name? Well you're offering improper sacrifices on my altar. Yet you ask, How have we offended you by treating the table of the Lord as if it's of no importance? For when you offer blind animals as a sacrifice, isn't that not wrong? And when you offer the lame and sick, is that not wrong as well? Indeed, try offering them to your governor. Will he be pleased with you or show you favor? asks the Lord of Heaven's armies. But now plead for God's favor that he might be gracious to us. With this kind of offering in your hands, how can he be pleased with you? asks the Lord of Heaven's armies. I wish that one of you would close the temple doors so that you would no longer light useless fires on my altar. I am not pleased with you, says the Lord of Heaven's armies, and I will no longer accept any offering from you. For from the east to the west my name will be great among the nations. Incense and pure offerings will be offered in my name everywhere, for my name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. But you are profaning it by saying that the table of the Lord is common, and its offerings despicable. You also say, Oh, how tiresome it is. You turn up your nose at it, says the Lord of Heaven's armies, and instead bring what is stolen, lame, or sick. You bring these things for an offering. Should I accept this from you? asks the Lord. There will be harsh condemnation for the hypocrite who has a valuable male animal in his flock, but vows and sacrifices something inferior to the Lord. For I am a great king, says the Lord of Heaven's armies, and my name is awesome among the nations. Now you priests, this commandment is for you. If you do not listen and take seriously the need to honor my name, says the Lord of Heaven's Armies, I will send judgment on you and turn your blessings into curses. Indeed, I've already done so because you are not taking it to heart. I'm about to discipline your children and will spread awful on your faces, the very awful produced at your festivals, and you'll be carried away along with it, and then you'll know that I sent this commandment, so that my covenant may continue to be with Levi, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. My covenant with him was designed to bring life and peace. I gave its statutes to him to fill him with awe, and he indeed revered me and stood in awe before me. He taught what was true. Sinful words were not found on his lips. He walked with me in peace and integrity, and he turned many people from their sin. For the lips of a priest should preserve knowledge of sacred things, and people should seek instruction from him, because he is the messenger of the Lord of Heaven's armies. You, however, have turned from the way. You've caused many to violate the law, and you've corrupted the covenant with Levi, says the Lord of Heaven's Armies. Therefore I have caused you to be ignored and belittled before all people, to the extent that you are not following after me and are showing partiality in your instructions. Do we not all have one Father? Did not one God create us? Why do we betray one another, thus making light of the covenant of our ancestors? Judah has become disloyal, and unspeakable sins have been committed in Israel and Jerusalem, for Judah has profaned the holy things that the Lord loves and is turned to a foreign god. May the Lord cut off from the community of Jacob every last person who does this, as well as the person who presents improper offerings to the Lord of heaven's armies. You also do this, you cover the altar of the Lord with tears as you weep and groan, because he no longer pays any attention to the offering, nor accepts it favorably from you, and yet you ask why? Well the Lord is testifying against you on behalf of the wife you married when you were young, to whom you have become unfaithful, even though she is your companion and wife by law. No one who has even a small portion of the spirit in him does this. What did our ancestor do when seeking a child from God? Be attentive then to your own spirit, for one should not be disloyal to the wife he took in his youth. I hate divorce, says the Lord God of Israel, and the one who is guilty of violence, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. Pay attention to your conscience and do not be unfaithful. You have wearied the Lord with your words. But you say how have we wearied him? Because you say everyone who does evil is good in the Lord's opinion, and he delights in them, or where is the justice of God? Ha, I am about to send my messenger, who will clear the way before me. Indeed, the Lord you are seeking, will suddenly come to his temple, and the messengers of the covenant whom you long for is certainly coming, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. Who can endure the day of his coming? Who can keep standing when he appears? For he will be like a refiner's fire, like a launderer's soap, and he will act like a refiner and purifier of silver, and will cleanse the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then they'll offer to the Lord a proper offering. The offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord, as in former times and years past. I'll come to you in judgment. I'll be quick to testify against those who practice divination, those who commit adultery, those who break promises, and those who exploit workers, widows, and orphans who refuse to help the resident foreigner, and in this way show they do not fear me, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. Since I, the Lord, do not go back on my promises, you, sons of Jacob, have not perished. From the days of your ancestors you have ignored my commandments and have not kept them. Return to me, and I'll return to you, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. But you say, How should we return? Can a person rob God? You're indeed robbing me. But you say, Well, how are we robbing you? In tithes and contributions. You are bound for judgment because you are robbing me. This whole nation is guilty. Bring the entire tithe into the storehouse so that there may be food in my temple. Test me in this matter, says the Lord of Heaven's armies, to see if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out blessings for you until there's no room for it all. Then I'll stop the plague from ruining your crops, and the vine will not lose its fruit before harvest, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. All nations will call you blessed, for you indeed will live in a delightful land, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. You have criticized me sharply, says the Lord. Oh, but you ask, well, how how have we criticized you? Well, you've said it's useless to serve God. How have we been helped by keeping his requirements and going about like mourners before the Lord of Heaven's armies? So now we consider the arrogant to be blessed. Indeed, those who practice evil are successful. In fact, those who challenge God escape. And then those who respected the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord took notice. A scroll was prepared before him in which were recorded the names of those who respected the Lord and honored his name. They will belong to me, says the Lord of Heaven's armies, in the day when I prepare my own special property. I will spare them as a man spares his sons who serve him, and then once more you will see that I make a distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between the one who serves God and the one who does not. For indeed the day is coming, burning like a furnace, and all the arrogant evildoers will be chaff. The coming day will burn them up, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. It will not leave them even a root or branch. But for you who respect my name, the sun of vindication will rise with healing wings, and you will skip about like calves released from the stall. You will trample on the wicked, for they will be like ashes under the soles of your feet on the day that I am preparing, says the Lord of Heaven's armies. Remember the law of my servant Moses, to whom at Horeb I gave rules and regulations for all of Israel to obey. Look, I will send you Elijah, the prophet, before the great and terrible day of the Lord arrives. He will encourage fathers with their children to return to me, so that I will not come and strike the earth with judgment. And after that, no one heard from the Lord again for another four hundred years. Only until John the Baptist came as the next Elijah the prophet, preparing the way for Jesus. I want to bring attention to the one time in the Bible that the Lord says to test him. Normally we don't get to test the Lord. He says don't test, don't put the Lord your God to the test. Come on. But here he offers an invitation in the form of a challenge. He offers it to his people, and I think it r it reflects his heart toward our money and our provisions that he gives us and how well we trust him. He says, Go ahead and make your tithes, be generous, give the first fruits, the first part of your paycheck to me every time it comes in. And just see if I don't provide more than you need. I'll tell you right now, full transparency, the worst financial season of our life was in a short season where we did not tithe. We had always given the first cut of every paycheck, every gig, everything that came in. We had always given that. I had done that my whole life. But the problem was when COVID came and shut down all of our income, and we were just bringing in, oh boy, a couple hundred, maybe in a good month, a few hundred dollars a month. Everything that came in, I was like, well, I need this to pay rent. I can't I can't give away any of this. And so for the first time ever, I stopped tithing. And that set in the worst financial season of our life. You might be like, well, Mike, obviously it was the worst financial season because you weren't bringing in any money. No, no, because we did not wait to bring in more money before we realized that we had been disobeying God and not trusting him with our money. We were trusting the couple hundred dollars we had more than we trusted the one who was giving it. So we leaned on verses like this in Malachi chapter three, and we leaned on teachings of Jesus like Matthew 6.33, talking about seek first the kingdom and he'll provide all your needs. We leaned on the Bible literally. We're like, you know what? I'd rather be accused by God of following the Bible too much than not enough. So, all right, we leaned on this and said, Alright, God, you can have the first of everything we have, and we returned to giving, and from there he has slowly but surely been restoring our situation. Since recommitting to tithing, we have not swiped a credit card, we have always had our needs met every month, not always more than a month ahead, but he has provided our needs whenever we needed them, and he has been faithful to that, and that has grown our relationship with him in that way. So, if you're not giving him anything from what you have, I think it reveals a heart issue of not trusting him, and probably not recognizing that anything you do have comes from him in the first place, and you're trusting yourself with one hundred percent of your money more than you're trusting God with ninety percent of it. That math doesn't sound so good. Especially when God says, just test me in this, just try me, just see if I I'm not able to provide above and beyond what you need. I can give firsthand testimony that God will be good on this promise. Well, it's in the Old Testament. Okay, it's still the same God. God will make good on this. If you trust him, if you say, Okay, God, you did this with the Israelites, I'm gonna trust you enough that that you will take care of me in this way too. Just see what he does. Just just humor him and just see how he pours out his blessings on you. It may not be the way you expect it, it may not be when exactly you want it, but he will prove that it's always worth trusting God in his promises. You're not gonna regret it. You are not going to regret trusting God. That's the thinking out loud thought for the day. We'll see you next time.