Malachi 2:17-3:6

2:17 Purpose

1.) “God has either changed his nature, and so is no God, or he favors our enemies; for he does not immediately execute vengeance.”

3:1 Prophesy (v1-5)

1.) The messenger to prepare the way.

What does it mean to prepare the way?

Mark 1:3 “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.”

Joh 1:27  He it is, who coming after me is preferred before me, whose shoe's latchet I am not worthy to unloose. 

2.) The messenger of the covenant.

3:2-3

1.) Do you think you’ll stand?

2.) The Prophet here directs his discourse to the ungodly, who though they seem to burn with desire for God’s presence, do not yet wish him to be nigh them, but they flee from him as much as they can.

3.) The reason why he mentions the sons of Levi rather than the whole people; as though he had said, that though the people of God were corrupt and polluted, there would yet be a remnant which God would save, having purified them. (v3) the Levites themselves, who should have been a guide of holiness to the others. God promises that the fire would consume the whole people, and yet purify the true believers. He tells us afterwards that the Levites themselves would need a trial to cleanse them; for they themselves would not be without filth, because they had mixed with a perverse people, who had wholly departed from the law, and from the fear and the worship of God. (v4) And only then would the righteous people present themselves with zeal to worship their God.

3:5

1.)Here we read that the LORD is coming for judgment and he will be a swift witness against the great sinners of the people for judgment will be immediate. The sins that the prophet listed here covered a wide array of crimes, from the gross violations of the moral code to the breakdown of social justice. Not caring for the poor and needy and the foreigner were serious matters in Israel. Psalm 72 makes it clear that the ideal king must champion these people; and James reminds us that this is at the heart of pure religion.

2.) And so Malachi’s messages continued to convict the so-called good people of his day, as well as today. Such people think God should come and judge sinners, punishing them for their failure to do works of righteousness. They have looked out and seen things they think God should punish. But ironically they did not look within to see their own sins that must be dealt with.

So, as we read through this passage we ask, “What is in here for me?”

While in the midst of injustice we must remember to:

Examine Ourselves Personally.

To Beware of Hypocrisy (v17. 3:1; 5)

Ragan wanting a full-sized mirror

We often view sin as being an “out there” issue instead of an in me problem.

Craig Edwards, “Lord, help me to be as aware of the sin in my own life as I am in the lives of others.”

To Be Conscious of our place in Biblical Justice. (v5)

I believe it is mandatory to address our nations current situation here. How many of you have heard of the SJWs?

Sin- Khata

Genesis 1 - Imago Dei

10 Comm. Half Godward/ half man-ward. Sin against another man is sin against God. (Joseph and Potiphar’s wife)

Another thing in the Bible is that many people thought they were exceeding by sinning (Pharoah enslaving Jews, Saul and David)

Sin is not just doing bad things, it is descriptive of how easily we deceive ourselves in telling ourselves that what is evil is really good or justifiable.

And we have found our culture surrounded with people who are masking what is evil with an aroma of goodness and it is called Social Justice.

Wikipedia said, “Social justice is also a concept that some use to describe the movement towards a socially just world. In this context, social justice is based on the concepts of human rights and equality and involves a greater degree of economic egalitarianism through progressive taxation, income redistribution, or even property redistribution. “

The Egalitarian view of Marxism are not satisfied with a level playing field. The view of Marxism is that there must be equality of outcomes at all call and if you prevail above another then you are privileged and it must be redistributed.

1. Let’s quickly use finances as an example and then we’ll move on.

The Bible commands each individual to do what they can to help the poor., the Marxist demands society does it by governmental force.

The Bible encourages giving out of love, the Marxist brews resentment for the wealthy by teaching they achieved it through robbing the poor.

2. “After the Ball: How America will conquer its fear and hatred of gays in the 90’s”. In this book the authors describe what they call propaganda strategies with 3 phases.

Desensitize - Overwhelm

Jamming - Associate disagreement with horrible things

Conversion - Becoming an ally. How? By attaching it to the Civil rights movement.

3. It is dangerous because it subverts the Kingdom of God by stating that the state can offer the good life over God’s way and that the only way there is by abolishing His law. So really, the Christian view on the world is Social Righteousness for the term Social Justice has been robbed. We must care about those around us as pictured in the Law of God. So we must take care that our hearts are stirred to personally invest and care for the widows, the fatherless, and the outcast. James describes this as pure religion. What makes this movement so dangerous is that it pretends to be God’s way by using His language divorced from His definition.

Inigo Montoya - “You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means”

The next things to do in the midst of injustice is to:

Rest in God’s Plan:

His Delay of Judgment is Often Out of Mercy, not Anger.

His judgment may be slow, but it is for the growth of His people. (Psalm 37)