INTRODUCTION:
When I was a boy, living in a little place called Imbler in
Eastern Oregon, I got my first job delivering newspapers for the La Grande
Evening Observer. At that time, according to the signpost at the outskirts
of town, Imbler had a population of 98. I delivered about 45 papers every
night after school to folks in town and to farms around the valley. I
started that job when I was 7 years old. In fact, somewhere in an old box
of memorabilia I have a yellowed newspaper clipping about me being the youngest
paperboy in Oregon at that time.
During the 3+ years that I had that job I learned some things
about money that have served me to this day. I learned how to keep track
of income and expenditures. I had to keep records and turn in a monthly
report to the newspaper office. I learned how to bank money and keep a
savings account. I learned how to make decisions
about spending or not spending. I learned about tithing. And I
learned about the value of money and gifts.
Lots of people are confused about these things. For example,
they do not know the difference between “cheap” and “inexpensive.” A gift
can be inexpensive but precious at the same time; however, “cheap” will always
be just that and nothing more. In the OT God made provision for poor
people who could not bring a bullock or a sheep to offer up two little
turtledoves as a sacrifice. Their sacrifice was inexpensive but when
offered to God from a heart of love and gratitude it was a sacrifice precious
in His sight. On the other hand, an expensive prize-winning steer, if
offered grudgingly or of necessity, was a meaningless sacrifice and an exercise
in futility as far as winning God’s favour.
TRANSITION:
In the Book of Malachi, we have a description of what was going on
in Israel 100 years after the captives returned from Babylon. The people
were comfortably resettled back on their land. Things were going
well. They were prosperous once again. Their Temple had been rebuilt
and the priests were busy doing their religious stuff. Everything was
pretty much back to normal, which was
exactly the problem. They dropped back into their spiritual apathy and
complacency, doing the
right things but forgetting the WHY of it all. Their worship turned
into ritual. Their service turned into religious habits. Their
sacrifices turned into castoffs good for nothing else. They lost sight of
who God was and what He had done for them. They forgot all the pain and
misery their sin had led to in the past when they strayed away from the LORD
and got sent into captivity. But were they so different from us?
MAIN BODY:
Verse 6: “A son honours his father, and a servant his
master. Then if I am a father,
where is My honour? And if I am a master, where is My respect? says the LORD of hosts to
you, O priests who despise My
name. But you say, ‘How have we despised Your name?’”
- This
is the second dialogue of the Book of Malachi. The first began up in
verse 2 with the LORD saying to Israel, “I have always loved you,” and the
people responding, “How have you loved
us?” Responding to their question the LORD explains about how He
sovereignly chose them above all other nations to become His own covenant
people.
- Now
here in verse 6 once again we hear the LORD’S voice. He says, “A son honours his father, and a
servant his master. Then if I am a Father, where is My honour? And
if I am a Master, where is My respect?” In the OT God
referred to the nation of Israel as His son and while it is true that
individual Israelites did not consider God to be their Father in the
personal sense, the people of Israel would regularly refer to God in their
prayers as “Our Father,” and they would call Him, “Adonai,” which means
lord, or master. However, Yahweh is pointing out to them here that this is
all just lip service if they do not genuinely honour and respect Him in
their hearts. (cf. Isaiah 1:2)
- If
I am respectful to my boss when I think he is watching or listening, but
make fun of him and say horrible things about him behind his back, do I
really respect him? And if I call my dad “father” to his face but
refer to him as “my stupid old man” when I am with my friends, then do I
really honour him at all?
Verse 7: “You are presenting defiled food upon My altar. But you say, ‘How have we
defiled You?’ In that you say, ‘The table of the LORD is to be despised.’
- Here
the LORD gets down to specific things that reveal the rottenness and
hypocrisy of their attitudes. As you will notice on the outline I
have given you, this section deals primarily with
the defilement of the priesthood, but it applies to the people as
well. The priests offered the sacrifices that the people brought to
them. In many cases they should have refused to offer the sacrifices,
but they were more concerned with pleasing men than God.
- “…presenting
defiled food…” Some
versions say “bread,” which is a literal translation of the Hebrew word,
but Malachi is using it in the broader sense of food offerings, and
specifically meat offerings as we see in the next verse.
- The
people’s response is angry and immediate. Once again, they act like
they have been insulted, so God goes on to explain: “In that you say, ‘the table of
the LORD is to be despised.’” The “Table of the Lord” refers to the
altar of burnt offerings in the Temple. But did they ever actually
say that with their mouths? Probably not, but like we learned a long
time ago, “Actions speak louder than words,” and this is what
their actions were screaming in God’s ear.
Verse 8: “But when you present the blind for sacrifice, is
it not evil? And when you present the lame and sick, is it not
evil? Why not offer it to your [Persian] governor? Would he be
pleased with you? Or would he receive you kindly?” says the LORD of hosts.
- Long
ago in Leviticus 22:17-22 God had instructed His people about what kinds
of sacrifices were acceptable and those that were not: “Then the LORD spoke to Moses,
saying, 18 ‘Speak to Aaron and to his sons
and to all the sons of Israel and say to them, “Any man of the house of
Israel or of the aliens in Israel who presents his offering, whether it is
any of their votive or any of their freewill offerings, which they present
to the LORD for a burnt offering— 19 for you to be accepted—it must be
a male without defect from the cattle, the sheep, or
the goats. 20 Whatever
has a defect, you shall not offer, for it will not be accepted for you. 21 When a man offers a sacrifice of
peace offerings to the LORD to fulfil a special vow or for a freewill
offering, of the herd or of the flock, it must be perfect to be accepted; there
shall be no defect in it. 22 Those that are blind or fractured or maimed or
having a running sore or eczema or scabs, you shall not offer to the LORD, nor make of them an
offering by fire on the altar to the LORD.”
- To
offer cut-rate sacrifices and second-hand gifts to the Lord is an
insult. Again, this comes through clearly in Deuteronomy 15:21, “But if it has any defect, such as lameness or blindness, or any serious defect, you shall not
sacrifice it to the LORD your God.”
- Now
I am going to step on some toes right now. Just like it was back in
Malachi’s day, many Christians today think that they can bring their old
castoffs to the Lord and that He will be thrilled with their “sacrifice.” We
will go through our cupboards and pull out all the old food that is near
or past the sell-by date and we bring that for the church food closet,
feeling good that we are helping the poor. Or we will go through our
closets and pull out our old raggedy clothes that we would not be caught
dead in and we bundle them up and take them to Union Gospel Mission or
Salvation Army and get a tax write-off and feel very spiritual and
generous. We will buy a new 72 inch 3D HDTV with surround-sound for
our living room and pack up our ratty old television set that barely works
anymore and drop it off at the church, saying, “We want to invest this in the Lord’s work.” We will spend
thousands of dollars fixing up our own houses but whine and bemoan having
to spend money on God’s House or even to show up for an all-church
workday.
- It
seems to me that these are the same kinds of attitudes that the LORD was
accusing the people of Israel of having. Am I wrong?
- I
love the LORD’S suggestion to them: “Try doing this with
your governor and see how he likes it. Let’s just see how
long it takes for him to throw you out of his office.” Obviously, he
would not be happy with their lousy junk and neither is God.
Verse 9: “But now will you not entreat God’s favour, that He
may be gracious to us? With such an offering on your part, will He receive
any of you kindly?” says the LORD of hosts.
- People
were bringing their old sick cows to offer to the LORD as
sacrifices. They were bringing their lame sheep and diseased goats
that had no value in the market. The LORD says, “Take your old sick cow and give it to your
governor and see how happy it makes him.”
- I
am sure that this observation from the LORD did not go over very
well. Those folks thought they were doing all the right things to
keep God satisfied, and they thought that He should be happy with whatever they chose to give to
Him. They were having a hard time seeing their own hypocrisy and
selfishness, but that is a common ailment. There are prominent
wealthy Christians that are very willing to give away their money, as long
as the new building gets named after them. They will donate to a
cause so long as it becomes the “So-n-so Memorial Fund.” Do you
really think that kind of thing makes God happy? I do not.
Verse 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.”
- This
is an interesting verse. We can hear God’s broken heart here. “Isn’t there anyone among you who can
see what you are doing and would have the courage to bar and lock the
Temple doors to keep people from profaning My altar with these scabby
sacrifices?” Sadly, there was apparently no one with the gumption
to see the problem here.
- From
God’s viewpoint no sacrifices would be better than
defiled sacrifices offered from impure motives. (cf. Isaiah 1:11-15)
Verse 11: “For from the rising of the sun even to its
setting, My name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense is going to be offered
to My name, and a grain offering that is pure; for My name will be great among the nations,” says the LORD of hosts.
- Even
though His own people were negligent in honouring Him, the LORD Jehovah
here declares that the day will come when even the Gentiles will come to
honour and revere His name and will offer pure and holy sacrifices to
Him. Twice in this verse He says: “My name will be
great among the nations.” That is both a statement of fact and of
intent. God says it, so it will be so. You can count on it!
Verse 12: “But you are profaning it, in that you
say, ‘The table of the Lord is defiled, and as for its fruit, its food is to be
despised.’”
- By
“it” the LORD is referring to His sacred name, Yahweh.
- I
took the name of this sermon from this verse: They were offering “cheap
sacrifices on tainted altars.” Not only were the sacrifices
themselves worthless, the attitudes with which they were given defiled the
very altar itself.
Verses 13: You also say, ‘My, how tiresome it is!’ And
you disdainfully sniff at it,” says the LORD of hosts, “and you bring what was
taken by robbery and what is lame or sick; so you bring the
offering! Should I receive that from your hand?” says the LORD.
- The
priests had come to consider their work in the Temple as distasteful,
monotonous, and burdensome. They sniff at it in contempt, the way
Eli’s sons, Hophni and Phinehas, did in 1 Samuel 2:17, “This sin of the young men was
very great in the LORD’S sight, for they were treating the LORD’S offering
with contempt.” That
which should have been a high honour and a privilege had come to be
commonplace and meaningless. This is the danger in ministry, both for
pastors and for lay people. We can get so busy doing religious stuff
that we forget why we are doing it, and
for WHOM we are doing it. The holy becomes homely. The righteous
becomes only rite.
- “Should I
receive that from your hand?” This question by the Lord is obviously
rhetorical. The answer is “NO!”
Verse 14: “But cursed be the swindler who has a [perfect] male in his flock and vows it, but sacrifices a blemished [literally, corrupt female] animal to the Lord, for I am a great King,” says the
LORD of hosts, “and My name is feared among the nations.”
- Here
the LORD pronounces a curse on anyone who knowingly withholds the
unblemished male animal for himself, and instead, gives the
diseased or blemished female animal to be offered unto the LORD. This
attempted deception is a double affront to Yahweh-Tzavaót, Lord Sabaoth,
Yahweh Lord of the Armies of God.
- Again,
the LORD declares Himself to be “a Great King.” He is the LORD of the
hosts of Heaven. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords, and His
great name is to be feared among all the nations.
CONCLUSION:
For the past 30 or so years there has been a great movement in
America to liven up worship services and to make them more attractive to
unbelievers. This has been in response to surveys taken in which these
kinds of questions are asked: “What is your general impression of church?” and,
“What would it take to convince you to come to church?” Many people
respond to the first question with the one-word answer, “BORING!” The
second question evokes a variety of answers but they all ultimately fall into
the “What can you do for me?” category.
The problem is that many people, including many who identify
themselves as Christians, believe that God exists to make us happy and to do
nice things for us, and that worship is supposed to be fun and
entertaining. But that is the total opposite of the truth. We exist
by His choice, for His pleasure, at His service, owing Him everything. And our worship is supposed to bring God
pleasure. It is not about us. Paul, in Romans 12:1 points out that to
love, honour, obey, and serve Him is our “reasonable service of worship.” He
is right.
What is more, God deserves our absolute best, not our old
castoffs. He, who gave everything for us, deserves our total
allegiance. And the very word “sacrifice” means that what we give to Him
will be costly to us, just as the sacrificial gift of His Son was costly for
Him.
King David understood this concept. In 2 Samuel 24 we read that at the prompting of the Lord’s
prophet, King David made plans to build an altar to the LORD where they could
offer burnt offerings. Starting in verse 18 we read, “On that day
Gad went to David and said to him, ‘Go up and build an altar to the LORD on the
threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.’ 19 So David went up, as the LORD had commanded
through Gad. 20 When Araunah looked and saw the king and his
officials coming toward him, he went out and bowed down before the king with
his face to the ground. 21 Araunah
said, ‘Why has my lord the king come to his servant?’ ‘To buy your
threshing floor,’ David answered, ‘so I can build an altar to the LORD, that
the plague on the people may be stopped.’ 22 Araunah said to David, ‘Let my lord the king take
whatever he wishes and offer it up. Here
are oxen for the burnt offering, and here are threshing sledges and ox yokes
for the wood. 23 Your Majesty, Araunah gives all this to the king.’ Araunah also said to him, ‘May the LORD your
God accept you.’ 24 But the king
replied to Araunah, ‘No, I insist on paying you for it. I will
not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing.’ So,
David bought the threshing floor and the oxen and paid fifty shekels of silver
for them. 25 David built an altar to the LORD there and
sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. Then the LORD answered his prayer in behalf of the
land, and the plague on Israel was stopped.”
David understood that to offer to God cheap sacrifices on defiled
altars would be to dishonour God, and to dishonour His name. He understood
that a sacrifice that costs us nothing is no sacrifice at all, but merely a
religious ritual.
Yet
how many of us have learned these lessons? All too often we want to give to
God our leftovers, our castoffs, our leavings. We will give Him a little
bit of time if we have
any left over. We will give Him a little bit of our money if we have any left after buying all the things we want for
ourselves. We will give Him a little of our service if we are not
too tired after going out and doing all the things we love to do. We will witness for Him if we
do not have to go out of our way to do it. We will serve others if they are very nice to us and smell good, and
if we can do it at a convenient time.
And
what is amazing is that we cannot figure out why God would not be overjoyed
with these wonderful sacrifices that we bring to Him. Sometimes He seems
so unreasonable and so ungrateful for all we do for Him, don’t you think?
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