The Coming Day of the Lord - Part 2 (Mal 3:6-15)

Announcements

Children’s Ministry Volunteer Training, Saturday, August 27th, 9am-2pm. Breakfast and lunch will be provided.

Discipleship Groups will start September 4th at 9am, every Sunday—Children will meet in the Activity Room; Adults will meet in the Auditorium.

Let me remind you to continue worshiping the Lord through your giving. To help you give, we have three ways to do so, (1) cash and checks can be given at the offering box. Checks should be written to Grace & Peace; debit, credit, and ACH transfers can be done either by (2) texting 84321 with your $[amount] and following the text prompts or (3) by visiting us online at www.giving.gapb.church. Of course, everything you give goes to the building up of our local church and the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Prayer of Repentance and Adoration

Call to Worship (Ps 59:1-10)

Our Call to Worship is Psalm 59:1-10—this is a psalm of David in which he reflects on his enemies who are pursuing him, to kill him, despite him doing no wrong. It is a prayer for God to deliver him from the evils of his enemies and to judge those who treacherously plot evil. Our text for this morning, ends with a reflection by David concerning God and his steadfast love being made apparent to him. Please stand and read Psalm 59:1-10 with me—I’ll read the odd-numbered verses; please join me in reading the even-numbered verses.

Psalm 59:1–10 ESV

1 Deliver me from my enemies, O my God; protect me from those who rise up against me; 2 deliver me from those who work evil, and save me from bloodthirsty men. 3 For behold, they lie in wait for my life; fierce men stir up strife against me. For no transgression or sin of mine, O Lord, 4 for no fault of mine, they run and make ready. Awake, come to meet me, and see! 5 You, Lord God of hosts, are God of Israel. Rouse yourself to punish all the nations; spare none of those who treacherously plot evil. Selah 6 Each evening they come back, howling like dogs and prowling about the city. 7 There they are, bellowing with their mouths with swords in their lips— for “Who,” they think, “will hear us?” 8 But you, O Lord, laugh at them; you hold all the nations in derision. 9 O my Strength, I will watch for you, for you, O God, are my fortress. 10 My God in his steadfast love will meet me; God will let me look in triumph on my enemies.

Congregational Singing

Oh, How Good it Is (332)

Come, Behold the Wondrous Mystery (184)

Scripture Reading—Jeremiah 17:5-10

Our Scripture Reading is Jeremiah 17:5-10, I won’t give much detail about the background, other than to make the statement that Jeremiah is calling out the sins of Judah and in doing so, he makes it very clear that those who trust in man will be cursed, but those who trust in the Lord will be blessed. It also reminds us that God is the one who searches the hearts and tests the minds of man. Tara can you read Jeremiah 17:5-10 for us?

Jeremiah 17:5–10 ESV

5 Thus says the Lord: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. 6 He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land. 7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. 8 He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.” 9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? 10 “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”

Sermon (Malachi 3:6-15)

Introduction

If you have your Bible, please turn it to Malachi 3:6-15.

We’ve been working through Malachi over the past month/month and a half and we’re actually really close to the end. We’re looking at this message and one more message to close off the text. This makes September 4th being the date for the start of our new series, The Acts of the Apostles, which will be an expositional study through the book of Acts.

We have two more sermons through Malachi with the remaining two sermons focusing on The Coming Day of the Lord. Now, you might hear this morning’s message and question how I can title it The Coming Day of the Lord when it doesn’t seem to speak of the Day of the Lord, but remember, the whole mindset throughout Malachi and especially here at the end of Malachi is that the Israelites ought to repent before the Coming Day of the Lord. So, even though this passage doesn’t exactly speak of the Day of the Lord, it’s the Day of the Lord that emphasizes or enlarges the warning at hand to repent.

Let’s read Malachi 3:6-15 together.

Malachi 3:6–15 ESV

6 “For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. 7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, ‘How shall we return?’ 8 Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions. 9 You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. 10 Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. 11 I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts. 12 Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts. 13 “Your words have been hard against me, says the Lord. But you say, ‘How have we spoken against you?’ 14 You have said, ‘It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts? 15 And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.’ ”

As we study this passage together, we’re going to break it into three parts. I know we’ve already worked through vv. 6-7 last week, but we need to work through it again because it lays the foundation for the remaining verses. So, (1) Returning to God (6-7), (2) Giving to God (8-12), and (3) Serving the Lord (13-15). This text is yet another call for the Israelites to repent, to return to the Lord. And in this text, we’re given two ways that they ought to repent and it has to do with their giving and their service towards Him. Basically, the structure is this: our first section lays the foundation and the second and third sections then build on that foundation. And really, what we’ll see in this message is that if the Israelites really want to return to God, they can start by first fixing their improper giving and their lackadaisical service towards the Lord. The call is for them to return to God in their giving and their serving as part of their overall return to the Lord.

Prayer for Illumination

Returning to God (6-7)

Remember that we have worked through the first two verses just briefly last week, but as I said in the introduction, these two verses lay the foundation for what we’re working through in vv. 8-15, so it would be wise for us to take another look at vv. 6-7, which focuses on God’s immutability and the need for the Israelites to return to Him. V. 6, “‘For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. from the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts.”

The foundation for what’s to come in vv. 8-15 is found in the concept that God doesn’t change; He is immutable. And because He doesn’t change, the requirements for the Israelites remain the same.

They were well aware of what was required of them, which is why God’s statement concerns their lack of obedience towards His statutes or His rules.

God confronts them and states that “from the days of [their] fathers [they] have turned aside from [His] statutes and have not kept them.”

What this tells us is that they do have knowledge of the truth—they do know the laws and the statutes. It can be reasonably assumed that they had heard them from their youth from their fathers and their forefathers.

It isn’t a matter of knowledge in this case, it is a matter of disobedience towards the Law that He had given them.

God is holding them accountable for their disobedience—He’s holding them accountable for their sin.

It is notable that He stresses His immutability while mentioning their disobedience. It emphasizes the fact that God’s requirements for them weren’t changed because He didn’t change, but rather they changed when they chose to disobey Him.

God is the same yesterday, today, and forever; so whenever you find a distance between God and you, it isn’t a question of whether God left you, it’s always because you chose to distance yourself from God.

And the primary way that Christians distance themselves from God today, is through unrepentant sin—just like the Israelites changed and separated themselves from God through their sin, so can believers today distance themselves from God through their sin.

What God is saying in Malachi 3:6 is that He didn’t change, they changed; thus, they need to return to Him—they need to repent, they need to turn from disobedience to obedience.

The fact that He hasn’t changed is evidenced in the truth that He is still keeping His covenant with them, “For I the Lord do not change; therefore, you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.”

He is still caring for them, He is still providing for them, He is still keeping His promises towards them.

But they are refusing to obey the covenant that they had made with Him.

Nevertheless, God assures them that if they simply return to Him, He will return to them V. 7 ends with a rhetorical question “But you say, ‘How shall we return?’” It’s rhetorical for two reasons: (1) you’ll notice that the Israelites aren’t the ones asking this question and (2) you’ll notice that God isn’t expecting a response because He’s giving the response. The Israelites need to change, they need to return to God—but how? God reveals two of the ways that they need to return to Him in vv. 8-15, let’s look at the first in vv. 8-12.

Giving to God (8-12)

Malachi 3:8–12 ESV

8 Will man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In your tithes and contributions. 9 You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. 10 Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. 11 I will rebuke the devourer for you, so that it will not destroy the fruits of your soil, and your vine in the field shall not fail to bear, says the Lord of hosts. 12 Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts.

We see God pose another rhetorical question, “Will man rob God?” And before a response can be given, God states, “yet you are robbing me.” Again, He’s not expecting a response from the Israelites because He already knows the truth.

It is a severe accusation for the Israelites—to be accused of taking from God Himself, but of course, God already knows that they don’t understand how they’ve been robbing Him, so he brings up their own question, “how have we robbed you?” And the answer is found in the very same verse, “in your tithes and contributions” (almost every other translation renders this as tithes and offerings).

Now typically, when we speak of tithes and offerings in our modern context, we simplify terminology and just call it giving, but the Israelites were commanded to give very specific gifts to the Lord—both tithes, which they were required to give and offerings, which they gave out of their own volition.

The word tithe literally means one-tenth and the Law states that the Israelites were to give one-tenth of all their earned income—whether that was monetarily earned income or income from crops or income from the flocks. One-tenth of everything they gained was to go to God and was to be given to the temple.

Offerings or contributions included everything that they gave above their regular tithe—what they thought they ought to give simply because God blessed them.

The accusation from God in vv. 7-8 is that they’re robbing God by not giving their tithes and offerings faithfully—by withholding their giving, they’re stealing from God. Now you might ask, how is it possible to steal from God in this manner, but I think you’ll understand it better if you shift your perspective slightly.

We make a mistake when we think that everything we earn is of our own doing and everything that we gain is truly ours.

Consider Psalm 50:10-11. This is God speaking, “10 “For every animal of the forest is Mine, The cattle on a thousand hills. 11 “I know every bird of the mountains, And everything that moves in the field is Mine.” While the focus on Psalm 50 is that God doesn’t actually need sacrifices of bulls and goats and various items, there is a realization in Psalm 50 that all the earth is truly God’s.

Got Questions speaks of this verse and says, “God defies the notion that what people give to Him is ‘theirs’ and that they are being magnanimous in parting with their property for God’s sake. Many people today harbor the false perception that they own stuff and then give some of it to God. God owns the cattle on a thousand hills—is it really generous of us to give God a cow every now and then? If everything we have is the Lord’s, how magnanimous is it to give God ten percent?”

The reality is that we don’t really own anything, God allows us to steward all the good gifts that He has given us.

With that in mind because everything belongs to the Lord and since we don’t really own anything, when we withhold what God has asked us to give Him, we’re taking what’s really His, not ours.

God has given us financial means and other material blessings, not so that we hope in these means and blessings or we obtain them and use them just for ourselves, but rather so that we steward them or manage them well.

And of course, that includes providing for your family the needs that they have and it includes even enjoying the life that God has given you with the blessings that He has given you, but it also includes your giving back to the Lord—it is His.

The accusation against the Israelites involved their withholding of their tithes and offerings, which makes sense when you consider they had been accused of offering blemished sacrifices with impure hearts and wrong motives.

God refused to accept what they offered him errantly and because they didn’t offer Him what He had commanded and what He deserved, they robbed Him of what they ought to have given Him.

And because they’ve robbed God of their tithes and offerings, He pronounces a curse against them, v. 9, “you are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you.”

Now what exactly this curse is, is found further in the text and it involves the removal of blessings and the death of their crops.

We see a drought in v. 10, which appears to have already started and what Scripture calls the devourer in v. 11, which will destroy their crops—both their fruits of their soil and vine in their fields.

Which in an agrarian society, the loss of crops is absolutely devastating to not just their food source, but also their economy, their society in general, and their livelihood.

Because they’ve robbed God of the tithes and offerings that are owed to Him, they are cursed, but note that there is still the option for them to repent.

V. 10 calls them to “bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. I will rebuke the devourer . . .” and then in v. 12, “Then all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a land of delight, says the Lord of hosts.”

Note the command for them to “bring the full tithe into the storehouse.” For them, of course, that commands the need for them to offer a tenth of all their income—from their financial income, their income from their flocks, and what they receive from their fields.

That is what God expects from them because of the Mosaic Covenant made between God and Israel. And what He’s saying here is just a logical working from the Mosaic Covenant—if they obey His commands, they will be blessed; if they disobey His commands, they will be cursed.

At the moment of this text being written, they were experiencing the curse in the form of a drought and they were about to experience the curse in the form of the devourer, but if they simply repent and offer the tithes and offerings that they were supposed to offer, God would stop the drought and stop the devourer.

God absolutely takes His covenants seriously, which should be comforting to those within the covenant and terrifying to those outside the covenants.

Which brings us to the remaining three verses in which we see the impending judgment of the Lord. And in this instance of judgment, the judgment itself is more profound than the previous section of judgment. There is a fundamental difference between the person who serves the Lord and the one who doesn’t. And part of this call for them to return to the Lord is a call for them to return to serving Him. Look at vv. 13-15.

Serving the Lord (13-15)

Malachi 3:13–15 ESV

13 “Your words have been hard against me, says the Lord. But you say, ‘How have we spoken against you?’ 14 You have said, ‘It is vain to serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts? 15 And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.’ ”

In the same manner of the rest of the book, God makes a statement and gives a rhetorical question, “Your [meaning Israel’s] words have been hard against me, says the Lord. But you say, ‘how have we spoken against you?’” This brings up God’s last remaining statement for this section of the text and its one concerning what the Israelites have spoken against God.

And really, what we see in the last few verses is a general complacency or maybe a flippancy or disdain towards the idea of serving the Lord, v. 14, “you have said, ‘it is vain to the serve God. What is the profit of our keeping his charge or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts?”

Israel feels as if there’s no longer a point or purpose in serving the Lord, which is a serious accusation—and God calls what they say against Him harsh words.

In our modern use of harsh we would think that these are mean words or words that might hurt someone’s feelings—something that’s spoken in a harsh tone or in an arrogant or belligerent attitude, but the use of harsh in this context refers to what they’re saying as being hard or strong words spoken against Him.

These are words that are themselves hard or difficult.

And just like every other time in Malachi that God brings an accusation against Israel, the Israelite’s think that they’ve done nothing wrong, “How have we spoken against you?”

Which oddly enough, is exactly how most of us respond when we’re confronted by sin, as well. It is our flesh that causes us to automatically respond to the accusation of sin in denial.

But denying God’s accusation against them is worthless; He knows exactly what they said and we see it in v. 14, “it is vain to serve God. What is the profit?” And oddly enough, when someone is in unrepentant sin, this mindset of “it’s not worth serving God. What good is it?” tends to pervade their life.

For the Israelites, this mindset or attitude is the reason why they sinned when it came to robbing God of their tithes and offerings, when it came to worshiping God incorrectly, and when it came to only doing what God told them to do because they were trying to earn blessings from the Lord rather than doing them out of love for God.

And God calls them out for this.

They claim that it’s not worth serving the Lord, that there is now profit in doing so and then they end v. 15 with, “And now we [meaning the Israelites] call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.”

So, the Israelites not only think that worshiping God is useless because they hadn’t received the blessings that they thought were owed to them, but also because those who refuse to worship the Lord and choose evil seem to prosper.

Which, let’s be honest, for many people today, these are issues that have irked them as well. The fact that the evil or the wicked do seem to prosper is a complaint from Christians and non-Christians today and the fact that people seem to think that they are owed blessings from God simply because they claim to do all the right things is a complaint from people today. And just as a brief rabbit trail, let me explain these issues:

Those who are wicked that have an appearance of prosperity today, will not always prosper—Galatians 6:7-8 explains this well Gal 6:7-8 “7 Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a person sows, this he will also reap. 8 For the one who sows to his own flesh will reap destruction from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit.” The wicked might seem to prosper today, but by sowing to his own flesh, he will reap destruction eventually. Consider 2 Peter 3:9 “9 The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not willing for any to perish, but for all to come to repentance.”

Christians who think they deserve blessings simply because they “do all the right things” have a fundamental misunderstanding of who God is and what we deserve—God is not a genie in a bottle that can be rubbed a certain way to grant you wishes nor does He simply bless people and curse people frivolously (consider the book of Job and Job’s friends and their remarks about the calamity that he faced). And God does not owe you any sort of blessing—the only thing that you’ve earned by “doing the right things” is the consequences for your own sin. Every blessing that you’ve received in life is the result of the goodness of God. James 1:17 “17 Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.” God doesn’t owe you anything, but He chooses to lavish you in grace and He chooses to give you mercy and He gives you blessings not because you deserve them, but because He loves you.

The issue is that the Israelites are looking at God and they’re looking at the people around them and they’ve come to the conclusions that God should have blessed them instead of the “evildoers [that] not only prosper but they put God to the test and they escape.” And that serving God is vain or useless and not worth their time.

They’re looking at everything around them and they’re thinking that it would be better not to serve God because what those around them have seem better than what God has given them.

Except and here’s a big part of the problem, though they claim to be doing things correctly, it’s clear that they really aren’t; though they claim that they love God, it’s clear that they really don’t; and though they think that they ought to be blessed simply because of who they are, it’s clear that they don’t really deserve the blessings that they think they deserve. And what God is calling them to do is precisely what He says in v. 7, “Return to me, and I will return to you.” He wants them to repent and part of that repentance looks like them actually giving what they’re supposed to give and serving how they’re supposed to serve, which brings us to our application for this morning. How do we apply such a passage? We can really apply it the same way the Israelites were meant to, with the exception that there are some minor issue that we have to resolve to apply it directly to our current day.

Application

Our application for this morning is identical to the Israelite’s. The Israelites were told that God doesn’t change and thus, the distance that they’ve experienced between them and God was due to their changing hearts and behavior. They sinned and thereby experienced distance from God. Thus, to experience the relationship that they need with God, they need to repent—they need to return to that right relationship with God. Two ways that will show that they’ve returned to God include their giving and their serving. Our application for this morning starts with the very idea that you may be living in sin and you might need to repent.

Consider your heart—are you living in unrepentant sin? Are you choosing to do what you know you ought not do despite knowing what is right? Have you turned aside from what God has taught us through His Word, are you living by choosing to do what is right in your own eyes?

For the Israelites in Malachi, they thought that they could worship God however they wanted, they thought they could offer whatever sacrifices they wanted, they thought that they could essentially do what was right in their own eyes and that God wouldn’t care.

That God would still bless them, that God would still protect them, and that God would still give them whatever they wanted.

When God pointed out their sins, they denied their sin and they accused God of being unfair.

Despite the fact that they treated God with contempt, they thought that God should still give them their heart’s desire.

Are you doing the same? Are you giving God whatever you don’t want? Is He your last priority? Are you living life however you want and you’re just sort of sprinkling a little bit of God in there every now and then?

Consider your heart in light of Malachi 3—now for the Israelites, two of the issues that are made apparent by God include their giving and their serving and really what we see in the text by keeping it in context is that the lack of giving and the serving aren’t the problems, they’re the symptoms of the problems.

What’s really going on is that the Israelites are in sin and because they’re in sin, they aren’t giving like they are supposed to and they aren’t serving like they are supposed to.

In fact, because they’re in sin, they’re giving God garbage and they’re envious of wicked unbelievers who have only an appearance of prosperity.

Likewise, your giving and your serving are symptoms of your heart condition.

Now the Israelites were given very specific commands when it came to giving—they were to give a tenth of everything that they received as income—whether that was monetary, grain, or livestock. They were then commanded to give an offering on top of the ten percent as part of their worship.

The New Testament command to Christian believers is a bit different—the New Testament doesn’t demand a tenth of our income, but it does encourage generous giving.

Paul, while asking the Corinthians to give to help the Christians in Jerusalem, who were suffering at the time, makes this point in 2 Corinthians 9:6-7, “The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”

Jesus is sitting with his disciples near the temple and Mark 12:41-44 tells us, “[He] sat down opposite the treasury, and began watching how the people were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large amounts. And a poor widow came and put in [two small copper coins, which make a penny]. Calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, ‘Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on.’”

Giving in the New Testament isn’t about giving a certain percentage, but rather giving with the right mindset and the right heart—the amount that you give financially is between you and God—the question is whether you have the right heart when you give or if you’re only giving what’s leftover, what you don’t really want, or if you’re giving in such a way that God doesn’t get the glory for your giving.

If you’re giving in such a way that God doesn’t get the glory, then it reveals your heart condition.

The Israelites were told how to serve and they were told how to live and despite knowing what was proper, they envied those around them for living in wickedness and seeming to prosper. They were commanded to live a certain way and serve the Lord, but they really wanted to live like the evildoers do—in sin.

Likewise, despite the fact that we no longer are required to follow all of the Old Testament Law, Scripture is still clear when it comes to what is sin and what isn’t. And the exhortation in the New Testament is to put off sin and put on righteousness.

Passages like Galatians 5:16-17 “16 But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. 17 For the desire of the flesh is against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, in order to keep you from doing whatever you want,” and Galatians 5:25 “25 If we live by the Spirit, let’s follow the Spirit as well,” tell us that there are certain sinful behaviors, the works of the flesh, that are to be avoided and there are fruits of the Spirit that ought to be sought after.

Ephesians 4:22-24 “22 that, in reference to your former way of life, you are to rid yourselves of the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit, 23 and that you are to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 24 and to put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.” It’s really no wonder that Paul emphasizes transformation in Romans 12:1-2 as part of our worship “1 Therefore I urge you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.”

Though we aren’t required to follow the Old Testament Law, the Bible has taught us how we are to live. And if we are to live in such a way that we glorify God, we must follow the Word of God and its instruction, 2 Timothy 3:16-17 “16 All Scripture is inspired by God and beneficial for teaching, for rebuke, for correction, for training in righteousness; 17 so that the man or woman of God may be fully capable, equipped for every good work.”

And the reality is, that a lack of disobedience when it comes to how you serve God and how you live—choosing to sin rather than live in such a way that God gets all the glory reveals your heart condition.

Or put in a different way, when you find yourself in life and you start seeing these sorts of symptoms—you aren’t giving the way you’re supposed to and you’re not living the way God wants you to and you aren’t serving how God has commanded you to—what you really need to do isn’t to just fix the lack of giving or the lack of serving and the unrighteous living (which by the way, are all sins), but you really need to repent of what has caused you to stop giving and stop serving and stop living right.

This morning, consider your heart—look at how you give, what you give, consider how you serve and check how you live.

If, when you consider these things, you realize that you’re in unrepentant sin—then repent, cry out to Jesus, and get back on track.

If, when you consider these things, you realize that you aren’t presently in unrepentant sin—then praise Jesus for enabling you to live in such a way that glorifies Him, but remain ever vigilant—it is easy to fall into sin and not even realize that you’re in sin.

Continuously consider your heart and consider the symptoms of a bad heart—repent when you need to, pray that you follow Jesus in a way that honors Him, and praise Him for enabling you to live in a way that glorifies Him.

Put simply, Malachi 3:6-15 reminds us that God doesn’t change and because He doesn’t change, anytime we experience any sort of distance from Him, it’s because we’ve changed—we sinned. Thus, (1) constantly consider your heart condition, (2) repent whenever necessary—return to Him, and (3) continue to live in such a way that brings glory and honor to His name.

In context with the theme of the coming Day of the Lord in Malachi 3-4, the idea at hand here is—consider your heart and repent because the Day of the Lord is coming.

Pastoral Prayer

Congregational Singing

The Power of the Cross (272)

The Lord’s Supper

At this time, we’re going to partake in the Lord’s Supper together. Let me just explain a few details before we pass out the elements:

This is the Lord’s Supper and at Grace & Peace we practice an open communion, which simply means that regardless of your membership status here—whether you are a church member or you aren’t, you are more than welcome to partake with us just as long as you have genuinely repented from your sins and have believed in Jesus Christ. Of course, parents, you are free to determine whether your children ought to partake, but let me encourage you to stray on the side of caution if you’re uncertain.

The Lord’s Supper is meant to be a somber reflection or memorial of the death of Jesus Christ to atone for your sins. As such, there is a warning that Paul gives to those who partake in the Lord’s Supper.

He states in 1 Corinthians 11:27-29 that anyone who takes part in the Lord’s Supper needs to first consider their own hearts. He warns that if you are to partake in the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner, you’ll be guilty concerning the body and blood of Jesus Christ. He states that some who have taken the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner have gotten physically ill and some have even died.

We understand partaking in the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner to mean that you either partake in the Lord’s Supper despite knowing that you’re in unrepentant sin or you take it flippantly.

So I would encourage you to seriously consider your heart—repent of any sin that you may be holding onto, and take the Lord’s Supper seriously.

We’ll have two people passing out the elements and I can assure you that neither one of them are watching to see if you partake—this is truly between you and God.

As we pass out the plates, you’ll notice that every cup is really two cups that are stacked on-top of one other. You will need to take both cups, as the bottom cup holds the bread and the top cup holds the juice.

When you receive the elements, please hold onto them and wait for everyone else to receive their elements so that we can partake in the Lord’s Supper together.

At this time, we’re going to take a about a minute to quietly pray, to reflect, and to repent if necessary—we’ll then pray corporately before the elements are passed out.

Deane, can you pray for the Lord’s Supper?

“On the night [that our Lord Jesus] was betrayed [He] took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, ‘This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”

“In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.’”

“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”

Congregational Singing

In Christ Alone (177)