God's Desired Worship

a) Last week we began a new series in Malachi, the last book of the OT. We saw Malachi was sent by God to call His disobedient & spiritually apathetic people to covenant faithfulness. The Lord began last week in v2 by saying: “I have loved you.” He reminded Israel of His electing love for them.

b) He reminded Israel that He’d chosen them to be His people out of all the people on earth. But Israel responded by saying: “How have you loved us?” After returning to Jerusalem from exile, Israel saw their circumstances & questioned how exactly God had loved them.  

c) As we’ll see today that skepticism of the Lord’s love spilled over into other areas of their lives, including their worship. B/c they doubted His love, they offered ½ hearted worship. I’ve titled today’s sermon: God’s Desired Worship. Let’s begin by hearing God’s holy word Mal. 1:6-14.

Here’s our 1st point in v6-10: Israel’s worthless worship.  

a) Look at v6: “A son honors his father, & a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear?” The Lord charged His people & their priests w/ despising His name. And how do they respond? “How have we despised your name?”

b) The OT priests served God’s people at the altar by offering sacrifices. And these sacrifices were the heart of OT worship. But in v7, Malachi said the priests were despising the Lord’s name & allowing the people to do the same: “By offering polluted food upon the altar.”

c) The Lord said in v8 they were offering blind, lame & sick animals as their sacrifices to the Lord. The people were bringing the weakest animals from their flocks & herds. Those that couldn’t walk or had a disease or some defect. Now the law required them to bring an animal w/o blemish.

d) God called His people to bring the best of their flocks & herds as an offering or sacrifice to Him. But the people weren’t doing that & the priests were accepting these offerings as if they would please & be accepted by God. The priests & people had little regard for God’s desired worship.

e) Now, notice the pride of the sinful human heart as they did these things. They said: “How have we despised your name? “How have we polluted you?” But then at the same time in v9, they were asking God to show them favor & bless them & be gracious to them.

f) They were offering God worthless worship, but yet wanted & expected Him to bless them. Here’s the problem. The value of what you bring to God is determined by what you think about Him. If Israel really believed God was their Father, they would’ve honored Him as such in their worship.

g) If they believed the Lord was their Master & they were His servants, they would’ve feared Him in how they worshipped & what sacrifices they brought to Him. But their worship revealed they were not honoring the Lord as their Father, nor living as if He was their Master.

h) Their worthless worship despised God & His name. And notice how the Lord responded in the middle of v8. “Present that to your governor.” The Lord says, if you were invited to visit an earthly ruler, what type of gift would you bring? Imagine you were invited to invited to attend a party or meet & greet in the oval office w/ the President & every guest was asked to bring a gift.

i) What would you bring? Something lame or defective? No! The Lord says to Israel, you would bring your very best. And why? B/c of what you think & believe about the governor. Israel would have seen that earthly ruler as someone w/ real power & authority over their lives.

j) They would have respected the governor enough to bring their very best. See, what we think about a person determines what kind of gift we give them. Let me explain it this way. Many Christians today think of worship as singing. But worship is an attitude, response or overflow of the heart.

k) That goes well beyond singing. The word worship actually means “worth-ship.” It means to ascribe to something or someone honor & respect or to proclaim their value & worth. What makes sin so heinous? We are telling God that sin has more worth or value or will bring us more joy than Him.

l) As God’s people, we are called to worship the Lord b/c of who He is: our Creator & the sovereign ruler of the universe who is good, loving, gracious & kind. We’re called to worship Him b/c of what He has done. He chose us & called us & saved & redeemed & ransomed & reconciled us.

m) He adopted us as His own & has blessed us. See, the Lord had loved Israel like a Father. He had ruled over them & led them like a good Master. He deserved their honor, respect & worship. But Malachi says, the Lord was not being honored or feared or worshipped as He deserved.

n) There was no reverence for God. They treated God & His name as worthless. Which leads to God’s 2nd response in v10: “Oh that there were 1 among you who would shut the doors that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, & I will not accept an offering from your hand.” Don’t miss what the Lord is saying to His people.

o) He’s saying I wish someone would come & shut the gates of the temple so your worship would stop. He was sick & tired of their worthless worship & sacrifices. Now imagine if God told us: “Shut the doors of CrossWay. I’m tired of your heartless & worthless worship.”

p) Now of course, we no longer offer animal sacrifices as part of our worship to God. But Rom. 12:1 says: “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy & acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”

q) As those united to Christ by faith, we are called to offer our bodies & whole lives as living sacrifices to God. That’s our spiritual worship. Does our worship & daily living reveal how highly we esteem & honor God as our Father & how reverently fear Him as our Lord & Master?

r) Does our daily living & worship reveal that we truly believe that our lives are no longer our own, but we’ve been bought w/ price to glorify God w/ our bodies & whole lives? What does our worship & how we live declare what we believe about God? What does it say about God to others?

s) Are we offering God half-hearted or worthless worship on Sunday mornings or when go to a Bible study or a community group or when we serve God throughout the day? God knows our hearts. How we live & worship reveals what we believe about the Lord & His worth & His value.

Here’s our 2nd point in v12-14a: Israel’s wearisome worship.  

a) Now v12 repeats the same charge: Israel profaned the Lord’s name by bringing polluted offerings as their sacrifice. But v13 tells us something else about Israel’s worship. They weren’t just offering worthless worship & sacrifices, but they saw worship as wearisome. Look at the 1st part of v13:

b) “But you say ‘What a weariness this is’ & you snort at it says the Lord of hosts.” The word translated as weariness means to be tiresome, a hardship or a nuisance. The people saw worshiping God as a duty, not a delight. It was something they had to do, not something they wanted to do.

c) Worship became monotonous & boring to them. Let me ask you this question. Have you ever been so sick or unhealthy that walking across the room felt like a great burden to you? See, if you were healthy & well, walking across that same room would be a simple task that felt easy.

d) The same is true when it comes to worship. If you’re spiritually healthy, worship isn’t boring, wearisome or a burden. But if you’re spiritually sick, it becomes a bore & burden. If we understand who God is & who we are apart from Him & what He’s done for us, worship is not a drudgery.

e) It is a great delight. It’s the overflow of a heart that knows how holy God is, how deeply sinful we are & how great God & His salvation truly are. A heart that’s been changed to see God’s goodness & greatness can’t help but worship. But then look at the end of v13:

f) “You bring what has been taken by violence or is lame or sick, & this you bring as your offering! Shall I accept that from your hand? says the Lord.” The Lord says His people were not only bringing Him blind, lame & sick offerings, but stolen offerings: “what was taken by violence”.

g) Do you see what that means? Not only did stealing break the 8th commandment, it meant they brought God a sinful sacrifice. It also meant the sacrifice they brought cost them nothing. In 2 Sam. 24 the Lord’s anger burned against David b/c he took an unauthorized census of the people.

h) By numbering the people for military purposes, David revealed his pride & a lack of trust in God. As a result, God poured out a plague on Israel. To stop the plague, David was told to build an altar & offer sacrifices to the Lord. So David came to the threshing floor of Araunah to buy it from him.

i) But Araunah told King David he would give him the threshing floor & his oxen at no cost. David said this in 2 Sam. 24:24: “No, I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God that cost me nothing.” Do you see what David was saying?

j) David valued God so much & held Him in such high esteem he refused to offer a sacrifice that cost him nothing. But here in Malachi’s day, worshipping the Lord had become so wearisome that they stole animals to offer to God. And b/c it cost them nothing, it was no sacrifice at all.

k) See, if there is no sacrifice, it is no sacrifice at all. So the Lord said to them at the end of v13 & the 1stpart of v14: “Shall I accept that from your hand? Cursed be the cheat who has a male in his flock, & vows it, & yet sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished.”

l) B/c they had diminished God’s greatness, worship became a nuisance & a bore. Let me ask you: is coming here on Sunday & the singing, praying & preaching a weariness, nuisance & bore to you?

m) Is gathering for community group or serving God a nuisance? Is Bible study or prayer a duty you must do, or a delight & great privilege for you? Do you joyfully offer your time, treasure & talent to the Lord? Or, do you stubbornly withhold or begrudgingly give the Lord what He deserves?

n) Think about your money & your tithes & offerings? Is giving to the Lord a wearisome burden for you? Does he get your leftovers (if you have any), or do you bring him the first fruits w/ a cheerful heart knowing you owe Him all things? Or think about your time. We all have full & busy lives.

o) But, we also all have free moments each day. What do you delight to spend your time doing? If all your regular responsibilities got cancelled for 24 hours, how would you spend that time? Where would worship & spending time w/ the Lord fit in?

p) Think about how much time we diligently spend preparing for parties, dinners, job interviews, meetings, vacations & hobbies. Yet, when it comes to worship or serving the Lord, we frequently just show up w/ tired minds & unprepared hearts as if it’s something we just have to do.

q) Spiritual boredom leads to wearisome worship. That old great hymn declares: “I Surrender All” not “I surrender some.” May God help us to not see worshipping Him as wearisome!

And that brings us to our 3rd& final point in v11 & the end of v14: God’s desired worship.

a) If you noticed, I intentionally skipped over 2 verses. 1st, v11 says: “For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, & in every place incense will be offered to my name & a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations says the Lord of hosts.”

b) The Lord declared to His wayward people who were offering worthless & wearisome worship to Him that 1 day there would be no need for a temple or such animal sacrifices at all. All people in every land would bring pure offerings to Him in every place from the rising of the sun to its setting

c) The Lord declared 1 day His name will be great among the nations. His name will be honored & feared amongst His people. See, the Lord was telling His people, someone is coming to shut the temple doors & to bring vain worship to an end. And how did God accomplish this?

d) He sent a true worshiper in our place. He sent a genuinely submissive Son who gave His whole life in wholehearted worship to His Father. He sent a Suffering Servant who honored, feared & obeyed His Father even to the point of death on a cross. He sent His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.

e) He took on flesh & became like us to offer a life of perfect obedience. He joyfully worshiped His Father & longed to be in his Father’s house. He offered Himself & laid down His life as the perfect & final sacrifice for us & our sin. He rose from the grave so we might have new & eternal life.

f) And He did all that not just so we could be saved from our sin & His wrath & eternal punishment, but so we might become true worshippers. Not just when He returns, but now. So that now & forever we might be set free to fulfill the purpose for which God created us & saved us.

g) To image Him. To glorify Him. And to enjoy Him forever.

h) On the cross, the Father treated His Son as He should have treated Israel & us. The Father turned His face away from the Son as if He were the 1 offering worthless & wearisome worship. The Father treated His Son as if He were the 1 not honoring & fearing Him & despising His name.

i) And God did this so we might come to Him & be true worshippers. 1 Pet. 2:5 says: “You yourselves, as living stones, are being built into a spiritual house for a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”

j) United to Christ by faith, we are priests called to offer up our whole lives as a sacrifice of worship to the Lord. In John 4:23-24, Jesus told the Samaritan woman: “The hour is coming & is now here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit & in truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship Him. God is Spirit & those who worship Him must worship in spirit & in truth.”

k) To worship in truth is to worship God as He really is. Not how we want Him to be or we imagine Him to be. But as He’s revealed Himself to be. It’s to worship Him based on what He’s revealed to us that He has done, is doing & will do. It’s to worship Him based on a right valuing of His worth.

l) His value & worth is infinite. So, God’s desired worship is to treasure Him above all things. To worship in Spirit means to worship out of the overflow of a heart captivated by God’s great love & all that He’s done for us. And such worship is only possible b/c God’s Spirit now dwells in us.

m) The HS awakens us to see God’s beauty & splendor & glory. The HS awakens us to see how deeply sinful we are & holy God. The HS awakens us to all that God has done for us to save us & make us His own. It’s by the HS that we are able to cry out: “Abba! Father!”  

n) God’s desired worship aims to inspire others to see & celebrate this same God-centered passion. And such worship doesn’t just happen on Sunday or when the worship team is leading us in song. We can worship God in spirit & truth at work, at home & at church.

o) But it is only when we come to Jesus by faith that we are enabled to come to God as our Father & to honor & fear & worship Him w/ our whole lives. Jesus’ perfect worship & sacrifice allows us to come into God’s glorious presence not just as forgiven sinners, but as beloved sons & daughters.

p) How richly God has loved us in Christ! How fully He deserves the very best we can offer Him of our time, treasure & talent & lives. If you have never come to Jesus & given your life to Him as your Lord, Savior & master, may you come to Him today.

q) If you do, you will come not only to a Savior, but to a perfect & good Father from whom all blessings flow. You will come to a Master who will give you rest for your soul. If you are here today & sealed by the blood of the Lamb already, may you offer Him the worship He deserves.

r) May we be a people who present our bodies & lives as a living sacrifice, holy & acceptable to Him.  Let’s pray.