God is Worthy of Costly Sacrifices

Introduction

Welcome Back CR Students to MIDWK!!!!! We are so excited to be back and we have been praying over the Christmas break that God would do a fresh work in our student ministry this semester. There are big things coming up. REACH WKND is in a month and a half, Summer Camp is coming before we know it, we have some fun things in the works that we are planning at the end of the semester that we really think you guys are going to love, AND tonight we kick off a new series in an unexpected place in the Bible: Malachi. The last book of the OT. Leading up to REACH WKND. The last book of the Bible written before Jesus shows up on the scene.

The book of Malachi shows us what happens when God’s people stop worshipping Him from their hearts, making religion just a routine. After God returned Judah from exile to their land, they fell into the danger of taking God for granted and pursuing their own selfish desires. Malachi spoke words of warning to Judah, calling them back to sincere worship and obedience.

MAN! That sounds pretty heavy, but doesn’t that so applicable to us today? One of the things that I talk with most students about today when it comes to their spiritual walk with Christ is the realization that you really don’t take your faith as seriously as you know that you should. That you know what you feel like you’ve taken God for granted. That you’re tired of going through the motions but you just feel stuck…like you don’t know how to get out of this routine that you

Don’t Bring God Your Leftovers

God is worthy not of convenient sacrifices that work well for you. God is worthy of costly sacrifices that express, honor and fear and glory to His name. Obviously, we don’t offer animal sacrifices in the same way we see in the OT. But think of Romans 12:1, therefore, in view of God’s mercy, let us offer to him our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to him for this is your spiritual act of worship.

God, by his mercy in our lives calls us to present our bodies not like an animal, us, everything we are and everything we have, and there’s nothing more costly than this to us, ourselves on the altar as a living sacrifice. And yet, aren’t we prone to only offer to God that which is convenient for us to offer to God, that which isn’t costly to us.

We are all tempted everyday and especially that which is comfortable to us, church attendance, maybe read the Bible some, pray, give some money and make some sacrifices in our lives. Small here or there. But what has God called us to give him and worship? Everything. Everything we have, everything we are, our whole heart, our whole mind, our whole soul, our whole body, a living sacrifice before him.

Why do we think that we can get away with weak worship? We would rarely insult an earthly leader with disrespect and disinterest we so often give God. Our misplaced worship often flows from devaluing God and overvaluing stuff. In other words, we have very dim views of God and very inflated views of everything else.

God Hates Half-Hearted Worship

Half-hearted worship hardens our hearts towards God

It makes us not care when we are called out for it. (v.13) Weak worship hardens our hearts from caring that we have offended God.

Land the Plane

So we pray, God help us to give to you that which is pleasing before you, our entire lives, our whole heart, our whole mind, our whole soul, our whole body and worship to you. God, please keep us from convenient compartmentalization in our lives where we offer you this over here, but not that over there. God, maybe not to use language from the old hymn, not surrender. May we not surrender some. I surrender some to you. No God, may we surrender all to you, all of our possessions, all of our plans, all of our preferences, all of our dreams, all of our desires, all of our thoughts, everything....everything. We pray that you would take it all and lead us to steward it all for your glory, that you would be pleased with the sacrifice of our lives before you that you would spend our lives for the spread of your glory among the nations. You’re a great king, the Lord of hosts, and your name will be feared among the nations.

It’s dangerous to walk away from these warnings and corrections in this chapter and walk away unchanged, unchallenged, and unrepentant. One of the best antidotes for lukewarm affections for God is to meditate upon Christ. We need Jesus.

Our actions are often the result of our affections. We do what our heart wants. Malachi is a super practical book that illustrates what it looks like to be a people with misguided affections resulting in sinful actions. The picture of the priests bringing spotted sacrifices is a picture of half-hearted worship flowing from half-hearted worshippers.