The Overwhelming Love of God

It amazing all the different ways we worship and one short hour and a half. We worship and prayer we worship in song We Worship in giving we worship around the table and now we come to a time where we worship in the word. There's so many ways to worship Our God and I'm so thankful because he is worthy of every one of them. This morning. We are going to begin a new series. So if you're here for the first time this morning, you are here at just the right time you're getting in on the ground floor so to speak. We are going to be studying for 7 weeks The Book of Malachi. Anyway, so wait a minute Easter occurs in there. Yes, we're going to take three weeks off Palm Sunday Easter and the Sunday after Easter to discuss specifics around the amazingness of what happened at the resurrection of Christ. Then we'll come back after that before Mother's Day gets here and finish up the Book of Malachi. Now. I need to start out just by telling you guys that the reason partially that we are studying The Book of Malachi as a church right now is due to dr. Allen Mosley at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary last fall. He came up here to teach part of the demon program that's going on between our two State Convention and he held a conference for all of us who are pastors. And for a few days we spent time deep in the Book of Malachi. And so I am thankful to him. If you get to hear this doctor Mosley will notice that I am following the outline that you walked us through to a large extent and that is because as we looked at the text it was clear. He was a man who had been in the right place with God as he approached the Book of Malachi. So this morning we are going to start in Malachi 1 and look at verses 1 through 5. If you want to follow along in your own Bible, it's the last book in the Old Testament. If you grab a Pew Bible in front of you it's on page 801 according to my kids who are kind enough to look it up for me this morning. And if you have an app on your phone, it's very easy. It's the one labeled m a l.

Play read verses 1 through 5 to us of chapter 1 of Malachi and then pray and then we will celebrate our way through this text. the Oracle of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi I have loved you says the Lord. But you say how have you loved us?

Is not Esau Jacob's brother declares the Lord yet. I have loved Jacob. But Esau I have hated. I've laid waste his Hill Country and left his Heritage to jackals of the desert if he says we are shattered, but we will rebuild the ruins the Lord of host says they may build but I will tear down and they will be called The Wicked country in the people. With whom the Lord is angry forever. Your own I shall see this and you shall say great is the Lord be on the border of Israel. Take a moment and pray. Play Father we need your help this morning. By your spirit, we need to understand what your word says what it means and how it applies to us today. And so I pray Lord that you would speak through me and speak into the lives of all who are here listening. That we would be those who don't just hear the word and walk away but hear it and are changed by it and that comes through your spirit. And so we ask for your help during this time in Jesus name. Amen.

Have you saw the title of the sermon the overwhelming love of God and then you hear me read this text. You may say to yourself really was that a bait-and-switch there between the title and what the text is. Seems to be a fairly. angry text in some ways in terms of this discussion of Esau and Edom

but it's will find as we go through this letter which was written just after the Exile. If you've ever read as rare near Maya, it's just after that time the people that started to come back and already they've been sent away for the faithlessness already when they're coming back. They're heading down bad pads again until God sends word to them through Malachi Malachi is name actually means messenger and so he comes to bring the message of the Lord. So as we look at this what will see is that God's love doesn't always necessarily come to us in the way. We would expect it to But it always comes very strongly. Twin question. You may ask yourself when you think of God's love it. How can we know it? How can we have confidence in the Lord's love? Even when things are horribly wrong around us. How do we move forward in the love of God? and I want to start us this morning in verse one because if we understand this introductory verse to the Book of Malachi a lot of the rest of this book will make sense and A lot of the rest of the Bible makes sense if you understand what's being said here. First one says the Oracle of the word of the Lord to is Real by Malachi. If you want to understand God's love the very first thing you need to do is listen to the word of God. Because he is the one who is speaking here. You need to know the one who inspired the scriptures themselves. This is not starting off by saying aye Malik. I thought I'd write some thoughts down. I've been having It is an oracle a word from the Lord to Israel by Malachi problems for us because we're not his real so we have to figure out and ask the Lord is speaking to Israel in this letter this this Oracle this this prophecy. How does that apply to us today? And the great news for us is this the same sort of struggles that Israel was having as they came back into the promised land are the same sort of struggles that we're having now. So so when we see the issues they were working their way through as they worked through issues of financial poverty as they worked through issues of a being confused about what worship really is about not being harder than a commitment to the Lord. We can look around at the world around us today. Yeah. Okay. We understand some of what's going on here. And so although we are not Israel directly. There is application for us to be had in this word. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been included in the Bible. But the Lord spoke to Israel by Malachi. And it is for their benefit and for ours. No, the one who inspired the scriptures. Play 1st Corinthians 2:14. It says it this way the natural person does not accept the things of the spirit of God for their Folly to him and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. Which means this if we're going to know the one who's inspired the Bible we need to have the same spirit that end dwelt Malachi when he was writing this into us and our understanding of it in order to know God. We need the spirit of God to intervene in our lives and so is she read through the Bible not only this text but everything that you read through the Bible pray that in prayer plead with the Holy Spirit Come show us more of God.

We also listen to the word of God and that we commit to learn what the word actually says. 2nd Timothy 3:16. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching for reproof for correction and for training in righteousness.

Because this is an oracle. The word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi and immediately inverse to he starts speaking. We need to know what the content of God's word r I have loved you verse 2 says the Lord.

I have loved you. Says the Lord the very first thing to this troubled people who are struggling to figure out how to live for the Lord in the land of the day of return to he's got to correct them. He's got to work with them. They're going to question him over and over again in this the first thing he says, I love you. But it's crucial for all of us to understand. If you are a Believer here this morning, even when you hear things said in God's word that are hard to hear understand he is saying them in the context of his great love. He doesn't speak to us who are Christians out of hatred. He speaks to us out of love. God has always loved his people and so he approaches it from that perspective.

This word of the Lord came to us. To Israel now To Us by Malachi so learn from those who teach the Bible Malachi was willing to be used by God to write down things. You said his people needed to hear 1st Thessalonians, 2:13 puts it this way. We also thank God constantly for this that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but it's what it really is the word of God, which is at work in you believers. Malachi wrote stuff down The Malachi was not alone in his writing. The Holy Spirit was inspiring. What was written when we read this book. We are not just working our way through and idea.

We are seeing Malachi's heart as it was following the Lord put down for us in the word.

now We're going to get to know God's love by knowing his word.

We immediately see the problem in verse 2.

first to begins

I have loved you says the Lord.

and immediately the people say how have you loved us? Do you see the problem here? God speaks and rather than having confidence in God's word. I will embrace the fact that God has said he is loved me they question and say really How have you loved us?

What have you done for me lately God? Their heart is completely in the wrong spot. They don't start from a position of I will trust that what the Lord says is true. And figure out what that means in my life, they start from the perspective of skepticism and saying I don't think so. Prove it to me.

If we're going to listen to the word of God, we need to not deny the very things that God declares. They do it here in Malachi. 1:2 will do it again in 1/6 a little then into 17.

Why?

Why do we sometimes do that? We've all done it at some point, right we read something in the Bible I go. Yeah, right. Why because so often we trust our eyes and our ears are our physical senses more than we trust. All Mighty God. We assume when we look at the situation around us. That's true and nothing else can be true, but that

Israel looked at their situation and said we don't believe we are being loved cuz what we're experiencing right now is we've come back from exile to this ruined Landon are trying to put stuff back together doesn't line up with what we think love should look like so therefore you're not telling the truth God. Or we would never say that right. And yet we do. We have to be willing to look and say at our own Hearts When God Says something do we take him at his word do we trust him enough to say regardless of what my eyes see in my ears here in terms of my situation around me. God supersedes everything in my situation to the point where I can trust him fully even if what he says, I can't see it yet. I say yet because God's word always prevails.

If you want to understand God's love and willing to listen to the word of God. And then we continue on from here. We see them question his love but then God responds is not Esau Jacob's brother declares the Lord. Well, this is going to go in interesting place all the sudden. I don't think that's the answer Israel was hoping for.

Sierra I've Loved Jacob Jacob who was renamed Israel later on. He's he's the guy involved in this whole process. He gets love and relatively speaking. Esau is hated. Either God really hate Esau. Or you could say the love for Jacob is so great that anything Express to someone else looks like a tin comparison.

It is hard to get into the mind of God sometimes and no.

What we can find great confidence in this in the intention of God and speaking. This was to say my love for you is great and you can tell it because it's not the same love I have for everyone else. The second way we understand God's love best is to look at what God does look at the works of God. This process hear of when he chose Jacob and not Esau we call this election. We're looking at God's love for Jacob for Israel so greatly.

The nothing else can compare to it. He says to to Jacob. I will set my love on you in a special way. We read in the call to worship this morning in the Psalms that he has chosen Jacob for himself. Can meet something unique in that relationship between him and his room.

Kirsten credible thing he made a connection with Israel. I called them his people and showered them with a love so great that no other land around it could compare.

And yes, you didn't send Christ to them then. The love of God that you and I who are Christians have experienced in Christ in his death burial and Resurrection in the good news of the Gospel that sin has truly been dealt with in Christ forever and we are welcome to permanently into the family of God. Unshakably helped by God the love that we are shown almost makes the love that Israel was shown look weak by comparison. Oh, I hope you can see it as you read through this and hear about the promises to Israel in the things about the land around Israel that you look at your own life in Christ and see the gloriousness that God has shown to you is so much greater in are left in a sense of that. God could love that much.

Jacob's brother Esau went to the land and became the father of the edomites in that sense, which is why Esau it says his laid waste to his Hill Country and left its Heritage the jackals of the desert verse for if eat them says so so in the same way Jacob was renamed Israel. He saw as referred to buy his land.

We see someone who is experiencing what it looks like to choose against God. He saw did it from early on he sold his Birthright to be able to get a bowl of soup. He thought that things were more important around him than God himself was.

Now you may say well how does this play out in reality mean you bring up election and immediately some people in theology will run toward about choice and Free Will and all that good stuff. Let me just say this God can reconcile his ability to choose and our ability to choose together. We might not always figure it out, but he's got it together. He can only oversee all the plans he has for everyone for the Jacobs for the Esau's for everyone thinking reconcile his election and our choice at the same time. We cannot always although we should continue to try to figure out what it really means. We have to be content to times the fact that some things are God's secret. Some things are things. He understands that we struggle with and that's okay.

But we can still look at his choice and go by God's Works. He shows he has the capability to love and love deeply.

He can do it in such a way that his salvation for Jacob is shown because Jacob is not suffer the same consequences.

Edam is shattered laid waste to they're going to try to rebuild the ruins in the Lord says I'll tear them down to They're going to be known as The Wicked country the people with whom the Lord is angry forever.

Imagine for a second. If you're Israel. You just come back from Exile. You've been kicked out of the land. God gave you sent into captivity. Now you come back again. You're finally starting to get things turned around. And you hear about the fact that there are those with whom the Lord is angry forever cuz they're never turning back to him. And you realize God was angry with you. But now he's brought you back into the land. He's re-establishing that relationship between you and him and his place. He's not angry with you forever. He has granted you a second chance. He knows that your heart can be changed and he has chosen to change it and make it his.

Imagine The Joy if the people of Israel has heard this letter rightly and saw the second chance. They were being given in God.

U2

If you were here this morning and you are still breathing.

there is hope for you the gospel is here to be heard and embraced you say why I was here and I kind of left and now I'm kind of where I am, but I'm If you're here, there's a chance again. God is said I loved you enough. I'm going to tell you again. You can come you can come bend the knees submit the heart follow Christ you can in him.

There is a joy to be had when we see that God has given us in Christ to the ability to do what we did not even want to do on our own before. We can look at the works of God and salvation and find cratejoy.

And we can look at God's work in preservation and find that same Joy Jude verse 24 says this not to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy. Hear what you just is saying to us there. God is able not only to bring the people back to bring us back to him. He is able to keep us where he needs us.

Not only are you never so far gone that God cannot bring you back when he brings you back. He can keep you.

For some of you this morning you wonder if God says I've loved you and you know how if you loved me? I don't feel kept. I don't feel he'll I don't feel supported the things that are going on around me or tearing me apart. How am I being held? The fact that God even has you here amongst Brothers and Sisters in Christ this morning is his grace to you to remind you you are not in this alone. He promises he will never leave you or forsake you we put you in a group with Brothers and Sisters in Christ called the local church to confirm to you. My great love for you is so evident because I brought you in with all these other people who like you have good times and hard times and I sustained them all I can sustain you to

We know God's love by listening to his word. We know God's love by looking at his work.

Let me know God's love by recalling the greatness. of that love

when we read Verses 4 and 5. We see that because God is not angry with us forever because we are not permanently called The Wicked country.

That we can say great is the Lord. Spell God's way of Love is different from ours. It's very obvious in this text. We don't necessarily think of love this same way Isaiah 55 8 9 points this out to us and says my thoughts are not your thoughts. Neither are my ways. Neither. Are your ways my ways to Clara's the Lord for as high as the heavens are higher than the earth. So are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts God's purpose is indeed bigger than ours.

but if we look back if we look back at how the Lord has has worked with us, even when Israel was sent away into Exile God kept a Remnant and he brought that Remnant back any re-establish them and even though they weren't getting it right. He's sending the prophets to try to correct them to get them back on track again. He's doing everything he needs to do to show them the pattern of his great love but this is the last book in the Old Testament.

After the Old Testament, there is a. Of Silence 400 years of Silence before the New Testament begins. And yet when the New Testament Begins the Testaments that testifies to Christ God is putting on display again the glory of his great love he just picks up where he leaves off. He's displayed love all the way along and so when you read the Old Testament you see God's faithful love. Is Cason his his constant Covenant love for his people all the time. You should follow that pattern through the Old Testament. And then when you get to the New Testament and you see Christ and you hear the Declaration that like we talked about in the Cup today that there is a New Covenant that the Covenant Love and faithfulness of God is continuing even extended Beyond just what was offered there now, it is written permanently on our hearts. We are given the Holy Spirit to and dwellas we are free and Loft and showered with Grace when we come to Christ and repentance and Faith now now when you read the New Testament, you read it differently because now you can see the same God who's always been Faithfully Covenant Ali loving his people is still doing it in amazing ways now,

And so if Israel had the ability in verse 5 with their own eyes to see what God was doing and say great is the Lord beyond the borders of Israel.

If they had the ability and seeing that to say great is the Lord beyond the borders of Israel. How much more? Do we have the ability to say great is the Lord beyond all borders? The fact that we are gathered here today is a testimony to the fact that the greatness of the Lord has not diminished at all. If anything it is expanded in Christ, not just around Israel, but to the ends of the Earth. The fact that we are all gathered here this morning as a testimony to the greatness of God's great love.

So if we get into this book and we continue to see some of the areas of struggle and maybe you even works through some things on your own where you go more like that than I'd like to admit.

Come back to the beginning of the book remind yourself who saying this. This is an oracle of the Lord to Israel by Malachi applied to you because of God's covenant faithfulness. Come back to the beginning and remind yourself that God says I have loved you trust a minute. And then if you work through things in your life areas that need to get worked on you do it in the right framework. You're not doing it to try to somehow struggle enough to tempt God. So if I just get this right, he'll love me. No. He loves you need to Clara's that in the beginning and then he says let's work on all this stuff now.

Are we ready to work on it? I sure hope so as we continue to remind ourselves of who Christ is and how we are in him. We will have all that we need to be able to work through the rest of this book.

As we go to a time of prayer, here's what I want you to do.

I want you to to pray to think and pray for meditation from a Christian perspective is an interesting thing Eastern religions. Push everything out in Christianity. Its focus in what you focus in on something. What does it look like for sinners like us to be loved by God, which I did. Well there in prayer for a few minutes just stay there sitting that soak in that goodness.

And I want you two to think of those who you know, but don't currently know what it means to be loved like that. I want you to plead with the Lord show them that love to.

Is there something you need prayer for specifically passwords will be up front here. We love to pray with you briefly for a few minutes, but also love to play with you a lot longer if you want to come in during the week and we can sit around and have some coffee and pray for a while or tea if your tea drinker. We want to be able to pray with you. I also want to be able to pray with each other to take a few moments here. And when when we're done I'll close ass in order /