Princeton Presbyterian Church

Princeton Presbyterian Church (EPC) Sermon # 1657

October 6, 2024

Malachi 3.1-5                  Click here for audio worship.

Dr. Ed Pettus

(This is an extended outline, not a verbatim transcript.)

 

“The Gift of God’s Word”

 

“Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. ²But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fullers' soap. ³He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord. ⁴Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years. ⁵“Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts.

 

 

• A Broken and Corrupt People

 

Malachi is our final prophet in this series on the minor prophets. Malachi concludes not only this series but is the conclusion to the whole of the Old Testament. We have seen quite a bit of prophetic warning, indictments, calls to repentance, as well as reason to hope. With God there is always reason to hope. Out of God’s steadfast love there is hope for the lost. We know this because he has saved us, a people just as unworthy as anyone, but God saw fit to pour out His grace to regenerate our sinful deathly lives in order that we would be drawn to the Father through Jesus Christ.

Now Malachi’s time is about 100 years after the exile, so he is a little later than Haggai and Zechariah. The temple has been completed which was the goal of Ezra, Haggai, and Zechariah. But Malachi is dealing with a people who are no better at keeping God’s law than before the exile. The reason they were driven into exile was the judgment and punishment brought upon them for their sins in not keeping God’s commands. Now, in the temple worship they are not bringing the appropriate sacrifices but are desecrating the temple and the proper worship of God. Sick and blemished animals brought for sacrifice, going through the motions of prayer, profaning the covenant, and generally not keeping God's commands. And it was not just the people, the priests, the religious leaders who should have been obedient to God were just as corrupt. When you read through the book of Malachi you get the sense that the people felt entitled to do whatever they wanted without any fear of the consequences, as if God would not dare send them into exile again. They were a broken and corrupt people in need of a Savior.

 

• The Messenger

 

As we saw in Zechariah and the prophetic word toward Jesus' triumphal entrance into Jerusalem, so too Malachi points us in the direction of the New Testament to the messenger who will prepare the way of the Lord. Who is that? We know – we know from the gospels the one who would prepare the way for the Lord. John the Baptist. He was the one crying in the wilderness, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” When Jesus spoke of John the Baptist, He referenced Malachi 3.1, "What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, “‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you’" (Matthew 11.9-10). The long awaited Messiah had come, the way prepared by John, and the fulfillment of all the prophets fully and completely realized. It may encourage us to see the context and what else Jesus says in that Matthew 11 passage, Matthew 11.7-14 ⁷As they went away, Jesus began to speak to the crowds concerning John: “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? ⁸What then did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in kings' houses. ⁹What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. ¹⁰This is he of whom it is written, “‘Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way before you.’ ¹¹Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. ¹²From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force. ¹³For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John, ¹⁴and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. ¹⁵He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

He lifts up John as even more than a prophet, none greater. But what I think is important for us to see in this context verse 13, “For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John.” All the Prophets and all the Law prophesied, and their prophecy was all about Jesus! Jesus points out the same thing after the resurrection when He opens the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms to show the disciples that the Old Testament writings point to Christ Himself (Luke 24.27, 44).

 

• The Remnant

 

Malachi chapter 3 reveals the messenger we know as John the Baptist. It is a powerful fulfillment of the Word of God in the mouth of the prophet. But I think we would be remiss not to end our series on the minor prophets with a reading of the final words of the Old Testament and particularly two points. First from Malachi 4.1-3…

 

4.1“For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. ²But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. ³And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.

 

Judgment will come against those who are arrogant and evildoers. Verse 2 notes the pivot, “But for you who fear my name…” We have discussed these pivots before in the prophets and the pivot of Ephesians 2.4-5, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.” In Malachi the “but” is for those who fear God’s name. We call these the remnant. They are the few among all the sinful of Israel who have kept faith and kept covenant and kept commandment. For them the sun of righteousness shall rise. This is the Christ. This is the light of the world. This is the One whom John tells us, “In him was life, and the life was the light of men. ⁵The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1.4-5).

The prophet points us to the Savior Jesus Christ who is the light of the world. He is the rising sun of righteousness. The result of Jesus Christ giving His life and rising from the tomb is this:

1) Righteousness, making all things right in us and in the world – “the sun of righteousness shall rise,”

2) Healing, we are made whole in Christ - “healing in its wings,”

3) Life and joy, in abundance - “leaping like calves from the stall.”

 

One of the final words of Malachi and of all the Old Testament is the reference to the coming Messiah, Jesus Christ. This gives us so much more depth to understanding the Christ. This increases our understanding, faith, and life because God has given us a revelation since Genesis that One would come who would bring light and righteousness and healing, life and joy. Praise be to God.

 

 

• The Gift of God’s Word

 

The final gift of Malachi is the command to remember the Old Testament writings. Malachi 4.4-6, but particularly verse 4...

 

⁴“Remember the law of my servant Moses, the statutes and rules that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel. ⁵“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. ⁶And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”

 

Malachi 4.5-6 reiterate the coming of John the Baptist, but in verse 4 we see the call to remember. Memory was vital to the Old Testament because the people would forget the Law of God over and over which led to their sins, which led to forgetting what God had done for them, which led to the indictments and judgments and exile and suffering. Malachi, like the other prophets, points out those sins of Israel, but also offers a great hope in the One who will come. It is precisely in the Law that the hope is revealed in the coming Messiah. All who do not fear the Lord will perish and those who do fear God will be that remnant of God's own. Malachi ends this fourth chapter with warnings and the theme of hope. "Remember the law of my servant Moses..." So many times the people slipped into idolatry because they forgot the law of God. They abandoned the commandments of God. And yet, it was in the Law that hope was given. It was in the keeping of the Law that the fear of the Lord was matured and the eyes opened to what was promised to come.

We are the people commanded to remember the Holy Word. I am often trying to build the case for the Scripture. We set our minds and hearts toward God’s Word for the same reasons God commanded in the prophets, that we would remember His covenant, that we would trust in Him, that we would fear the Lord, that we would place our faith in the One who is our hope and our Savior. Psalm 119.6, "Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments." We do not follow the Law in a legalistic way as did the Pharisees and Sadducees, but we follow by being obedient to Jesus Christ. We follow in the wisdom of God, in prudence and with a biblical sense or understanding. It is a spiritual mindset given us by the Holy Spirit. That mindset is nurtured in God’s Word. It is not by chance that the Old Testament ends this way. It is a message for the Church and for Israel to remember God’s Word for the sake of our lives and our salvation. For the Word is life and light pointing us to the One to whom all the Old Testament points, the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is the wonderful gift of God’s Word in the prophets and the Law and the Psalms and the New Testament – in other words, through all of God’s Word. Glory to God. Amen.