Most of us don’t jump up in excitement and anticipation to read a short book like Malachi (just 55 verses) and about the ways we are betraying the Lord. We anticipate the dread of not being good enough, so we succumb to our temptation to avoid difficult messages. We hear “loser” in our minds so we satisfy our appetites for self-confidence with huge portions of “love and acceptance verses” from the Bible. The problem is that when these verses are understood out of their full context, they feed a distorted view of God and we’re left malnourished by worshiping our perception of God rather than enjoying the beauty and benefit of worshiping God fully on His terms. We discover that we don’t really believe He’s all-wise and that the details of Christian living aren’t all that beneficial to us!
The overwhelming message of Malachi is that God’s holy, initiating, pursuing, patient, and faithful love satisfies the strongest appetites. How does this happen?
First, God’s good passion for His glory to be known personally and throughout the world is seen through a call for the people He has loved to give every ounce of their life to wholeheartedly worshiping Him. Second, as we respond in faith—through repentance and obedience—by loving God and others as He prescribes, and for His praise, we discover (maybe for the first time) that God’s ways truly satisfy our souls! We stand in awe of the Lord and sing, “Great is the LORD among the nations!”
Malachi is the last of the minor prophets and the closing book of the Old Testament. Minor prophets are called minor only for their length in comparison to the longer, major prophets. Malachi means my messenger, and his name and purpose align as this man we know little about clearly and accurately delivers God’s message to the people of Israel.
Malachi proclaims a message of God’s unrequited love to people who have, to borrow from Malachi 1:2 and Revelation 2:4, forgotten their first love—the Lord who first loved them.
Written about 450 B.C., the Israelites had grown cold waiting for the Messiah and their faith had waned. The resultant failure to cling to the Lord’s promises grew into corrupt leadership, bland worship, men abandoning their families with rampant divorce, shabby social care, and neglecting proper tithing. “What’s the point of it all?” we hear them ask. “What’s in it for me?”
While Malachi is a prophetic book in its formal genre, it reads like a court case transcript—prose through which an attorney uses a question-and-answer style rhetoric to set up and detail His accusations, or disputations. After the rhetorical questions, God clearly articulates his arguments using His standard—the Mosaic Law.
God doesn’t pull punches in Malachi! But when he hits with truth, he steadies us in our stupor with abounding grace. This minor prophet has a major message we New Covenant Christians need to embrace. Don’t back away—run to the Lord. And don’t tiptoe into Malachi—dive in deeply and be washed with the water of the cleansing Word of God!
Series Outline
- Malachi 1:1-5 (Doubting God’s Faithful Love)
- Malachi 1:6-14 (Serving God the Leftovers or Cain’s Guide to Worship)
- Malachi 2:10-12 (Marry Someone Who Loves Jesus)
- Malachi 2:13-16 (Faithful Marriage for Godly Children)
- Malachi 2:17-3:6 (Questioning God’s Justice)
- Malachi 3:7-12 (Robbing God)
- Malachi 3:13-18 (What’s in it for Me?)
- Malachi 4:1-3 (Fear and Comfort in The Great Day)
- Malachi 4:4-6 (Reconciling Families)
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