Mother's Day 2017

Broken Marriages

As we have noted, the men of Israel were divorcing their wives so they could be joined in these mixed marriages. This blatant disregard for their marriage vows, prompted God to say that he hates divorce (v. 16). It violates his ideal of oneness (vv. 10, 15; ).

To say God hates divorce is to say that he hates everything that leads up to divorce, which means he also hates all our failures to work towards real companionship and oneness in marriage.

We may be inclined to think that what goes on in our homes doesn’t have any bearing on the rest of life, but it does. Here in Malachi’s day we find men going to meet the Lord at the temple, and the Lord points them back to their homes. Family life colours and influences every other part of life.

Opening Up Malachi The Appalling Nature of Treacherous Dealing

Malachi wanted his people to understand that the sin the Lord was charging them with was no small thing. Satan adopts the opposite strategy. He first entices us by telling us that the course of action he is proposing is not sinful. When conscience protests that it is, he then assures us that even though it is sinful, it really doesn’t matter all that much.

Roger Ellsworth, Opening up Malachi, Opening Up Commentary (Leominster: Day One Publications, 2007), 54–55.