Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / February 21, 2016 | Route 66 - Malachi

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February 21, 2016 | Route 66 - Malachi · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: How are you?
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's good.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: That's wonderful.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's a beautiful day, and we have come to the final book in our Route 66 series in the Old Testament.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: Alright, so go to Matthew, go a little bit left.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: We're at the book of what book are we at?
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: A couple nights ago, I was uh eating dinner at San Francisco with Jews for Jesus for a guy looks across uh at me, a businessman, and he goes, uh I follow you.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'm following Route 66 online.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: He lives in Georgia.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I say, Oh, that's cool.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: And he goes, and I see you've come to the only Italian book of the Bible.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I go, really?
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: Come again?
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: He goes, yeah, Malacci.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: He says, uh.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I responded the same way.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that's pretty cool.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, but you're not Italian.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: So uh anyway, that was that was pretty neat.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: So um there's a couple of other unique things about Malachi, besides the fact that it's the only Italian book in the Bible.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: God speaks more.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: God actually speaks more in this book than in any other prophetic book.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: Out of the 55 verses in Malachi, God actually is speaking in no less than 47 of them, which is like 85%.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, isn't that something?
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: You heard a book called God Calling or Jesus Speaking or whatever, God's actually speaking here in this book that much.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: And another thing is that people are arguing back.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: They're they're they're uh they're people are actually quibbling and disagreeing and interrupting more in this book than any other book, no less than uh twelve times in this book, you have people going, don't buy that, God.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'm hearing you, but I'm not believing you.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, I mean, you're going, really?
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna, you're gonna, you know, argue with God.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: But it happens a lot, and so almost everything God says, He's got to defend.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: He'll say it, and they'll go, nah, don't buy that.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not feeling that God.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: And God will go, uh, okay, well, here's the proof of what I'm saying's right.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: So um, but I think the reason that they uh do this in this book is that the people in Malachi's day are disillusioned.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why I've titling my message, God's Word to the Disillusioned.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and I'm thinking that some of you today, in the sound of my boy's voice, might be disillusioned.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: And what I mean by that, if I could encircle that word with a couple of other words that we don't use very often, and one of those would be jaded.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Jaded.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: Anybody ever use that word, jaded?
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: And that is just to use a sort of informal definition that's circulating on the web.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's the result of having a steady flow of negative experiences, disappointments, and unfulfillment fed into a person to the point where their anger circuits just sort of burn out, and they accept disillusionment.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so you're jaded.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: You're sort of at the end.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: You've had enough disappointments and unmet expectations in life, and you've finally gotten jaded, you've become, and that's the way the people in Malachi's day were.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: They had not their expectations hadn't been met.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: Say, uh, for instance, with the temple when they came to worship, that looked at this is the four about 450 BC.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Some say a little earlier, some say a little later, but it's around the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, so they'll, you know, they got walls and they got a little temple, but the temple is kind of, yeah, you know, compared with Solomon's temple, it's just kind of a, you know, like a dinky country church building or something.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's no thrill, right?
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's the Messiah thing.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they've been hearing for so long that the Messiah is coming, but has he come?
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so they're going, uh, I'm sorry, we've heard that so and you know, you know what that's like, don't you?
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Do you remember the first time you ever heard that Christ was coming, that that the Lord was coming back?
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: Do you remember how exciting that was to you?
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: Christ is returning.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Remember how pumped you were, how scared you were, how you immediately wow, he might return anytime, so you immediately confessed all of your sins, you know, and then that night you're kind of scared you're going to bed at night, and you go, oh, it might happen tonight.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: You put on your best underwear, you know, or whatever, because it could happen tonight, and so and and and you were really serious, but then he didn't come back, and so then you heard the next time you heard the message, you're still the heart, heart was beating, pumping pretty fast, but then you've heard that now 40, 50 times.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: And once you hear that so many times, like the people Malachi's Day, you go, you know, yeah, I'll go to church, but if I hear that message again, I'm I'm not buying it.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm feeling kind of jaded about that.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: Or my second word is blasé.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: Can you say that wonderful, beautiful French word?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Blasé.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't that just sound like cool coming off your mouth?
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Blasé.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: Nonchalant, bored, weary, detached, indifferent, distant.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: Blah blah blasé.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and because you just don't, you don't have it, you know, you're just because your expectations haven't been met.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And basically it comes about because you've been disillusioned.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: Disillusionment, yeah, yeah.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Those of you who who aren't watching online, there is a picture of a dog who's clearly disillusioned with life.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: He's suffering that feeling of disappointment resulting from the realization that things are not going to turn out as expected.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever felt that way?
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm guessing you felt that way about some of the same things that the people in Malachi's day felt it.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: They felt it about their finances.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: After all, a 50,000 of us, if we pulled up stakes from Persia, a wealthy area, and we came back to Jerusalem because we knew God wanted us to, we sort of felt like God would make the crops grow a little bit, like we wouldn't have to be living from meal to meal.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: And yet that's how we're living.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: We're living, you know, lower, lower middle class.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that doesn't meet our expectations, Lord.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so then if you combine that with being a little blasé, then of course they start shorting God, we find out in this book, on their gifts and on their offerings and on everything else.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: And they're they're going, you know what, God hasn't met my expectations.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: Why should I give him the best, you know, lamb from my flock?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: Or why should I continue to give him not only tithes but offerings?
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden they start going, and you know, the whole marriage thing, you know, I'm thinking, why should I marry, you know, Jewish Susie down the street who comes from a poor family?
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: When I could marry Canaanite Sally, who comes through town every month with her daddy, the merchant, you know, selling us stuff.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: There's a little money there.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so everything starts, you see, because when you're disillusioned, I love the poster that uh I saw in an office once of like a million emperor penguins standing around, and one of them says under the poster entitled Disillusion, he says, so let me get this straight.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're all emperor penguins, all of us?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: That makes no sense, you know.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Grew up being told he's an emperor penguin, thought he was going to be at the top of the list.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: Or, or, or it makes those of you, some of you, okay, all of you who've been married will understand this one, where you go into the tunnel of love, except the title over the tunnel of love is not just tunnel of love, it's tunnel of love, then disillusionment, then mundane humdrum coexistence.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: So what we're talking about here is that experience that we've all had of going through uh disappointment valley and coming out the other side jaded and blasé and disillusioned, and that's the way these people were that Malachi addresses.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's why Malachi, these 55 verses, are God's word to the disillusioned, to people who are saying, why bother?
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: Why be, you know, wholly devoted and all that stuff?
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Why be fanatical about God?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: After all, things aren't going well as I expected in my marriage and with my money, even with my worship, my church.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: Why bother with God's expectations and those things when my expectations haven't been met?
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: And God's answer is just surprising.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is the only book in the Bible where God starts off with a Valentine, where God starts off by saying, I want you to know I love you.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Take a look at chapter 1, verses 1 through 5.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: In the Holman we read, an oracle, the word of the Lord to Israel through Malachi, I have loved you, says the Lord.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Notice that God's response to disillusioned, blasé, recalcitrant, whiny, argumentative people is not to say, I'm about to stomp on you with my huge boot.
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: It is not the response of a king or a judge, it's the response of a jilted lover.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's the response of saying, listen, I I've loved you, I've always loved you.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, they go, Oh, I'm not feeling it, God.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: How have you loved us?
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not getting the vibe.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: You're telling me you love me, but it sure doesn't look like it in my life.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: How have you loved us?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: Interestingly, God's response is not to start listing what he's doing for them now, but to go back to the beginning.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: And basically to say, hey, from the very beginning, I chose you.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: The reason you're even sitting here in church this morning, dear Christian, is because I chose you and drew you to myself.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Wasn't Esau Jacob's brother?
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: And they're going, yeah, we're Jacob.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: We descended from Jacob, and he was a twin.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_00: His brother Esau, you know, came out first.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, and you chose Jacob, not Esau.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then ever since then, there's been this huge enmity back and forth, and Esau turned into the nation of Edom, and it's always trying to kill us.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, yeah, wasn't Esau Jacob's brother?
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: This is the Lord's declaration.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: Even so I loved Jacob, but I hated Esau.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: And there, every time you find both loved and hated in the Bible, it's it speaks primarily of preference, like you can't serve two masters, you'll hate the one, love the other, love the one, despise the other.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: So what it means is you you choose, you prefer one over the other.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, you know what?
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: I chose you.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't choose your twin.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: The reason, very reason you're here is I chose you and I've loved you ever since.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: Remember what I said through Jeremiah just a few years ago, that I've loved you with an everlasting love.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: Remember what I said to Moses years ago, that you're a holy people to me, the Lord your God, that I chose you to be a people for myself, Deuteronomy 7.6, a special treasure among all the peoples on the face of the earth.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: And remember how I clarified for you in the next verse that I didn't set my love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, because you weren't.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: You were the least of all peoples.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I didn't understand that I didn't choose you.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't bring you here to church this morning because somehow, you know, I looked down and you were the best looking of all people.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: Well, oh yeah, I guess you are.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you're the best looking, but the smartest, we're willing to go with that.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: And there's other smarter people in town and in Kansas and in America and in the world.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't choose you because you were the brightest.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't choose you because you're the handsomest.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't choose you because you're the most spiritual, because you weren't.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: I just graciously sovereignly set my love on you, Israel, and on you folks who are here.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: Not because of love, but sort of an in spite of love.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: Do you understand?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been faithful to you ever since.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: I've always loved you.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Even when you've wandered away.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: You ever sing that?
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: You ever sing that children's song?
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: We used to sing it in our home, you know, nearly every night of family devotions.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that that that that song uh Jesus loves even me, though I forget him and wander away.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Still he doth love me wherever I stray.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Back to his dear loving arms when I flee, when I remember that Jesus loves me.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: I am so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me, Jesus loves me.
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad that Jesus loves me, Jesus loves even me.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: And oh, if there's only one song I can sing when in his beauty I see the great king, then for eternity, my song will be, Oh, the wonder that Jesus loves me.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, Yeah, you've wandered away, but I'm still faithful to you.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm staying true to you even though you haven't been true to me.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_00: So his response, my response, he says, to those of you who are jaded and blase and don't feel like it anymore, and are just sort of half given up because you're so disillusioned, is I've been faithful to you.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: And and what I'd like from you, and now the other 50 verses of the book, is I'm just asking you to love and be faithful to me too.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: And now what God does is God does that in three ways.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: He says there's three ways, especially where you're not being faithful to me, where you're not being loving to me.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And in this book, he he tackles them one after the other.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: He says, I'd I'd really like for you to be faithful to me in your worship.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the main one.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then we have a couple smaller ones.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'd love for you to be faithful to me.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like you to be faithful to me in your marriages, because that's that's a relationship between you and me, not just you and each other.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_00: And third, in your giving.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now, uh what what I let me tell you what I've decided to do is, by the way, what I've decided to do about next week.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: See, we're coming up on Easter, and I didn't want to suddenly move into Matthew.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna wait till after Easter.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: So next week I have this sort of free Sunday, and I was kind of planning on doing a summary of the whole Old Testament, you know, for a while next week, and then I thought, oh my goodness, you know what I'd rather do, maybe?
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: I thought this is driving in this morning.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_00: I go, there's another option for me.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think I might preach the blank page in between the Old and New Testament, because I can then just make a bunch of stuff up.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: My dad actually taught a course in college uh on the on the West Coast for 30 years, entitled The Intertestamental Period, a long word for the 400 years between Malachi and Matthew before Jesus came.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: And there really are some interesting lessons from the days of Alexander the Great and other days, you know, about how God took care of his people, even though he wasn't giving them any more messages for 400 years, like sometimes you feel he's not doing for you when he doesn't answer your prayers.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm thinking I might do that, or I might do something else.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_00: So you let me know if you'd like me to uh do something.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: But but anyway, uh but what I want to do this morning is also a little squirrely.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: And the more I thought about this this morning I thought, you know what?
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to what what Malachi does, he takes the messages sort of in the these three things in the order of their importance, the most important first.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: But I thought, you know, I'm gonna pre- I want to preach them in the opposite order.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna preach them, I want to jump over worship, sort of, and I want to jump right to marriage and then go to giving and then end up with worship, which is like about a third of the book.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Can I do that?
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just let's just take this one about marriage, which is pretty famous.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: I've been faithful to you, God says.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like you to be faithful to me in your marriages.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: Turn in your book to Malachi chapter 2.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: There's seven verses on this.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: Malachi 2, 10 through 16, and you're gonna recognize the three famous words, I hate divorce.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: But Malachi 2 says, Do we not all have one father?
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: Didn't one God create us?
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being, key word here, unfaithful to one another?
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Judah has been unfaithful.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_00: A detestable thing's been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: Judah has desecrated the sanctuary the Lord loves.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: And here's the first problem.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: There are two issues with marriage, and the first is by marrying women who worship a foreign God.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: And you go, wow, that seems really kind of mean of God to say that he doesn't want the Israelites, his people, marrying, you know, people who aren't his people.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: Come to the New Testament.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: Remember that God of the New Testament says the same thing in 1 Corinthians.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he says, I don't want you to be unequally yoked.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: And our elders even have instructed us as pastors that if a couple comes to you and one of them is a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ and the other one is not, that you are not permitted to marry them.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells you you can't.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: And that just seems so mean.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, sometimes when we tell people that we can't do that, and we try to be gracious, it doesn't matter because they're really mad.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: They don't understand why God would be so mean.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: And what you need to understand, especially in the book of Malachi, is this is all vertical, it's not horizontal.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: People think when they come to you that it's all about me and my girl or me and my guy, and our marriage is all about whether or not I love her and she loves me, and whether or not we're compatible, and why in the world would you get in the way of that and stuff?
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, Well, do you don't understand why I invented marriage?
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, haven't you ever read?
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: He says Ephesians 5, we're at the end of the main passage in the Bible on marriage.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: My last words are, and this really marriage isn't really about you and her, it's all about Christ and the church, because the real point of marriage is that is that I invented marriage as a picture of my relationship with you, my love with you, and the fact that it's faithful, and the fact that it's two people are on the same page spiritually, and so forth.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so, so that's why it just sort of breaks.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't reflect the whole pattern at all, the whole love thing that you and I have going.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: The most important thing is you and me and our love and the relationship between Christ and the people he died for, and you're somehow, you know, you're just forgetting that.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so he says that that's the first thing that really needs to stop.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, it was even more important in 450 BC because the Messiah hadn't come yet, and if they'd all intermarried, then where was Jesus going to come from if he wasn't gonna come from, you know, the Jews?
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: But it still matters to God today.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: Now I have to stop and say there are a number of you here, Lord willing, by God's grace, who maybe came from, say, an unequal yoking.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_00: Some of you, you know, were led to Christ by your spouse.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: Or some of you, you know, led your spouse to Jesus Christ.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: In retrospect, you go, yeah, I know I shouldn't have been unequally yoked.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: Thank God by his grace I was able to do that.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm thanking the Lord too.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm just telling you that God says, listen, this whole thing's not about you and her or you and him.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: The whole thing primarily is about me and you.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: And though, and not only he says, uh the whole faithfulness thing about marrying people who also worship me, because you're proving that you really don't love me if you love her or him more when she doesn't worship me.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: But the second thing is divorce.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: When there's two of you that are in the family and you split with each other, now it's a patriarchal society then, so it was always the man kicking the woman out or divorcing her.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was awful.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: In New Testament times and Roman times, and under in Jesus' words, you know, suddenly it becomes more egalitarian.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: And as we know, wives divorce husbands as often as husbands divorce wives.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: But you need to fit that into Malachi 2.14.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: The Lord's the witness between you and the wife of your youth.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: You've been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: So the first problem is intermarriage.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: The second problem is divorce of a believer.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: So be on your guard and don't be unfaithful to the wife of your youth.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: The man who hates and divorces his wife says the Lord does violence to the one he should protect.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_00: So be on your guard and don't be unfaithful.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: And again, let me say that you're we I think we're all familiar with those famous three words I hate, divorce, Malachi 2 16.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: Says the Lord God of Israel.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: This is a personal relationship.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: When you divorce Someone then, uh, you know, a fellow sister in the family of God, and you divorce them that that breaks that reflection, that picture of my love, my relationship for you.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I hate it.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a kind of violence about it.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: He says to divorce your wife is to overwhelm her with cruelty.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one thing that comforts me in talking about this is that everyone in the within the sound of my voice who's been divorced hates divorce more than anyone else.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know the people in our world who hate divorce the most?
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_00: They're people who've been divorced because they know what kind of cruelty that is.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, sometimes sometimes there's there's a kind of physical cruelty about it.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_00: Or I'm laughing because I'd read, did you read the story about the I think she was in her middle 30s, the the British, the from the from England, the woman, she'd been divorced just two months before her husband.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: He was well to do, and and he's and he divorced her.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_00: And he got the house because he'd written all that stuff into the marriage agreement, and she was mad, and he was he was out for a week.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: She had a one last week in the house before she left, and so I shouldn't be laughing about this, but she buys 15 of these waiting pools for children, you know, these waiting pools, and she blows them up and she puts them all around the house, living room, and so forth.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: And then she buys 300 cans of chicken noodle soup and all these prawns, which she lets, you know, get rotten, and 50 rotten fish heads, and a bunch of bags of tea and so forth.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: So she loads all these.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: Why am I laughing about this?
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: I just think this is a stitch.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: So, anyway, she fills the house with all this stinky stuff and then leaves, you know, and allows it to smell.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And you're going, Jim, you're just so warped.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_00: But but, you know, so some my point is that sometimes there there is a kind of literal violence about it, or but I don't care whether there was literal violence or not, you know if you've been divorced, that there's always an emotional violence about it.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: It left scars on you, it's left scars on your ex, left scars on the kids, it leaves scars on your loved ones, scars on your family.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, I hate divorce because he loves you.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: God says, I hate divorce, not divorcees.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_00: I hate divorce because I love you.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I want you to understand that you should think twice, the second time, third time, fourth time before you divorce another sister or brother in the family of God, because the whole thing about marriage is that picture of my love for you.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: All right?
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: So that's the first thing.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's the first thing.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: I've been faithful to you, you be faithful too.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_00: So please be faithful to me in your marriage.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the second, also seven verses long, chapter three, six through twelve, is I want you to be faithful to me in your giving.
• 24:48
  SPEAKER_00: And again, we have a famous passage.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: We hear about it from TV preachers, we hear about it, you know, from Baptist preachers, we hear, you know, occasionally it's the whole tithes and offerings thing.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: And God says this in chapter 3, verse 8.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Should a person rob God, but you're robbing me.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: And they go, Well, well, God, you're losing it again.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_00: You're a little bit over the top.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: We're not robbing you.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: How are we robbing you?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: And God says, You've robbed me in your offerings.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: And in the tenth of your crops, you robbed me in your tithes and offerings.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: You remember, you understand the whole thing in the Old Testament, in the law, was God said, Listen, one of the ten, one of the twelve tribes, the Levites, I'm not giving them any land, I'm not giving them any businesses, they're not like the rest of you.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: They've got to survive.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: They're the ones who are gonna lead you in the worship of me, and so they're gonna completely survive on the tithes and the other offerings you bring.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: So tithe is a tenth of their corn of their crops and so forth.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't have coins until about 600 BC.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: So, so you bring one tenth of your sheep, you bring a tenth of all that, plus offerings on top.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's a half a dozen offerings, thanks offering, guilt offering, and so forth.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: Bring those, and that's how the whole tribe of Levi, that's how they survive.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: And now, of course, what happened is by this time we know that the Levites are starving to death because nobody's, they're just not bringing their tithes and offerings like they used to, and God says, You're robbing me.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're killing them, and you're also robbing me because you're not bringing the tithes and offerings.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: And then he says, Bring all the tithes into the storehouse that there may be food in my house, and try me now in this, says the Lord of hosts, if I'll not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such blessing that there won't be room enough to receive it.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now that's interesting.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_00: The bringing the tithes into the storehouse is, we could talk about that, but I don't have the time.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_00: But this other part, that the blessing, if you bring your tithes on, then they'll pour out blessing.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_00: I had a good friend, one of my best friends, here in the church for years, he was also church treasurer before the Lord took him, named Al.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: He always used to say, you know, you can't outgive God.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: Have you ever heard that you can't outgive God?
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: And you get that from this passage, you can't outgive God.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say, Al, I'm sorry, I know that's true, but I said that can lead to sort of a mercenary attitude, and yeah, I hear that all the time from TV preachers.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: One time, one time I had the guts to write a letter back to a TV preacher who's always famous for going, you send me a hundred, God will send you a thousand.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: You ever heard that?
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: You send me a hundred dollars, God will give you a thousand.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: Sort of a tit for tat, and my letter was something like, listen, let's cut out the middleman, you give him a hundred, and then God will give you a thousand, and we don't have to spend the time of you know playing the game.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: So um he didn't respond.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: He's still asking for the money today, but he's one of those people who who has over 40 million dollars personally.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_00: But but but you know, so I I I know this is true.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: I can tell you from my personal experience that once uh Melody and I made a decision in this area to get generous with God and to stop always squeezing and so forth, our our life, I mean, uh there's no other explanation to what's happened in our lives, I don't think, other than the fact that that we started getting generous with God.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you'll find testimonies like that a lot.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I am not, I do not want you to get mercenary about that.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: God is, last thing God wants is for you to start getting a ledger.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I gave to God, and I jumped that, so I expect God to give me more.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, here's the point is God says, I know how much you love me, partly by how you treat your family, the marriage thing, and partly by whether or not you're shorting me when you come to me.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now, then we come to the third, and this is the major one that leads into the others.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: I want you to be faithful to me, he says, in your worship.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: Would you look at this passage 1, 6 through 14?
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 6.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: Get ready for this, folks.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: Get ready.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_00: A son honors his father, God says, and a servant his master.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: So if I'm a father, where is my honor?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: And if I'm a master, where's my respect, says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests who despise my name?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: But you say, oh, come on, God, would you get off this?
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: How have we despised your name?
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 7, well you're putting defiled offerings on my altar.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you say, We're not doing anything of the kind.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: And then God says in verse 8, hold it.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: When you present the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil?
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_00: And when you present the lame, do you know, remember the rules?
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: You present what?
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: A lamb without blemish to God, the best rather than the worst.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_00: When you present the lame and the sick, isn't it evil?
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what was happening is is this people are still going to church, we'll say.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: People were still offering offerings, but they're disillusioned now, they're jaded, they're blasé, so they're going out and they're feeling like, you know what, my my economics are not what they used to be.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so they're looking over the flock and they're going, ha ha, nah, no, I'm keeping that.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, honey, let's keep the best for ourselves.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: But you know that uh the old blind one there keeps running into the electric fence and falling over, walking over rocks.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that one.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_00: And she says, Well, how about the one with three legs?
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, let's let's give them the one with three legs that's that's always sick, that we can't seem to make one.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: So what happens is, you know, they were grabbing the three-legged one, the sick one, and or whatever, and they're carrying that in there.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: God, we're bringing an offering.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: We're bringing one.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_00: Nothing's getting sacrificed.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: And God's saying here, whoa, whoa, hold, are you kidding me?
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_00: That that's what you're that's what you're bringing me.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: And do you see what he says immediately after?
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Why not offer that to your governor?
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: You think you think your governor would be happy to take that one?
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're giving the people down the street that you don't even like a better meal than that.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_00: Would he receive you kindly?
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: says the Lord of hosts.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_00: You think, you think, you think I'm happy with that?
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: You think that's what I deserve?
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: He says twice in this in this very chapter.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: He says, I'm the great king of the universe, and you're gonna bring, I'm the one who chose you and loved you.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the one who pulled you out of a miry pit and set your feet upon a rock.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the one who's given you all the sheep, lambs, anything you possess.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think I don't know what you're hoarding back at home for yourself?
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think I don't know what you're spending money on during the week?
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what you're gonna bring me.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: Last Halloween, I was uh the doorbell rang, I responded to the door and I looked out, and there were a couple of little boys.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: One was six, one was four, and even behind their masks, I knew that was Judah and Asher.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_00: My two oldest grandsons.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: And if in case I didn't know that, they sort of gave it away by saying, trick or treat papa, you know.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: And they held out those orange plastic buckets, you know.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I go, oh, really?
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_00: Uh candy, huh?
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: And they go, Papa.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: I say, well, and I bring over the big bowl, you know, that's got all my Halloween candy in it.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_00: And there's good stuff, you know, there.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's there's really good stuff.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: There's Reese's pieces, there's MM's, there's Kit Kat bars, there's Snickers, there's Skittles, which they absolutely love.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's there was even some of the best stuff which they liked about.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_00: Gummy worms are in there and so forth.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: And you can see their eyes, their eyes start to light up.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: Here you go.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_00: I said I dug my hand down to the bottom.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: I grabbed some of the candy corn.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: That candy the kids ate.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_00: A candy that had been sitting in glass bowls in our house for the previous three weeks, which they had been walking by, not even taking when it was free.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_00: Grab some of the candy corn and go, here it goes.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh papa.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Of course I didn't give them the candy corn.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_00: I go.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_00: Take what you want.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: Take three.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: No, take five.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: Take whatever you want, take the whole thing.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_00: But you know what we do is sometimes we we'll come to church and you know, we've used up the best of our time during the week and the best of our energy and the best of our money.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_00: And after all, we don't even like to sing.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_00: So we stand up and sing a little bit, and the sermon's sure not as interesting, you know, as the TV show was last night, or Downton Abbey's gonna be tonight.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, we pay kind of half attention, maybe, do a little stuff on the cell phone down below where people can see, and we give God a certain amount of attention.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_00: But after all, we're important people and we're busy people.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: And a number of you are, and you're really significant people at work or wherever you are, and and so you you come in and you think, God's gonna just be happy, I'm here.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, but that's what we learned in church, didn't we?
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_00: Even back when we were kids, and in youth group, you get to youth group, and they're just so happy.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: You're thanks for coming, thanks for coming.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: And when it's time to sing and you're not singing, please sing a little bit, boys against girls, this side against that side, a little bit louder, and if you sing a little bit louder, the youth director was just so happy that you made any noise at all.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so you come to church and you sing a little bit and you pay a little bit of attention, your mind wanders, but after all, in light of who I am, I mean, God, I am sure, he's so excited.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, when I did that little prayer a little while ago, I'll bet he was nudging the angels, going, Oh man, did you see that?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: God says, Well, you think I'm honored by that?
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_00: You think, you think, you think you're making me happy by bringing me a three-legged sheep?
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: You don't think I deserve better than that?
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_00: Would you pay, would you act that way if you're in the governor's office?
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Would you act that way even with someone you don't like?
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_00: Notice what he says.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry, it's gonna shock you a little bit.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Notice what God says in verse 10.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_00: He says, you know what?
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that one of you would just shut the temple doors.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_00: So you just stop lighting these altar offering fires.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not playing, I'm not gonna accept any offering.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you didn't hear that, you didn't hear that when you were growing up, did you?
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: That if you bring God anything less than the best, he would prefer, kind of, you know, that the church just locked the door and we just didn't even do church on Sunday morning?
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because God's not sitting up there lonely and desperate for anybody to pay attention to him and nobody did all week long.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: And oh, yeah, here they come.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, look at that, it's pretty good attendance.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they're singing pretty good this morning.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: And he's just so happy that you give him anything.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, no.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: God says, would someone just shut the door?
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: What's interesting is that God in the next verse says, you know, shut the door in your place.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't mean every door is shut, because all across the world I've got people who are giving me their best.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_00: He says in verse 11, My name is going to be great among the nations, from the rising to the setting of the sun, in every place, incense and pure offerings will be brought to my name, because my name will be great among the nations.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he says to us this morning, you know, down there in Egypt and over there in Iraq and in Libya today and in Morocco and other places, I've got Christians.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they're staying true to me and they're giving me their best.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: And when the threat comes in, they say, I'm standing true for Christ, and they're getting crucified, literally, or their heads getting chopped off.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: They're giving me everything.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: You're expecting me to be thrilled because you're you're giving me a three-legged sheep.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's what the Lord's saying.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_00: He says, I've been faithful to you.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've loved you with an everlasting love.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_00: I just want you to be faithful to me too, in three ways that really affect our relationship, he says.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_00: In your worship, when you come to me, giving me your best, in your marriage, which is a reflection of my relationship with you, in your giving.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just looking, looking for your best.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm I'm not threatening you, he says.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_00: He says, chapter 3, verse 6, I'm the Lord, I change not, therefore I'm not gonna consume you.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna wipe you out for this, but I'm just I'm just telling you, I'd I'd rather you not even play the game if you're gonna play a game.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_00: I I would really like, however, for you, he says it again as he does in nearly every book in the minor prophets, I'd like you to return to me.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_00: Because if you do, I'll return to you.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: Just like the prodigal and the father.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: He says, Can I tell you too?
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_00: This is the last dozen verses of the book, can I tell you that I've got all kinds of rewards up here that I'd just really like to dump on you if you will give me your best stuff, stuff that I'd really.
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things he says, one of the things I'll do for you is I'll write your name in a special scroll up here.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_00: Those who feared the Lord, I'm in 3.16, spoke with each other.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, they heard Malachi's message.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: They said, We're gonna give God our best from now on.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_00: And they responded, and it says, and the Lord listened to what they said, and in his presence a scroll of remembrance was written to record the names of those who feared him and always thought about the honor of his name.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: Those were the people who said, We're gonna give you our best.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_00: For you who revere my name, here's another promise in 42, they're just all the way through the end of the book.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_00: The son of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: What does that mean, Jim?
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure all that that means, but it sure sounds good, doesn't it?
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you'll give me your best, he says, I promise you, the son of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: Says a verse, verse two after that, he says, and the hearts of the sons will return to the fathers, and the hearts of the parents will return to the children.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of things he says, I want to do for you, but I'm not gonna do stuff for you if you just you know with a blasé, indifferent, disillusioned attitude.
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: You're bringing me your worst instead of your best.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_00: Will you?
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: He says.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Lord, for forgiving us, allowing us to return, allowing us to give you what you really deserve, our best.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_00: And for that being enough for you.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name we pray.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for coming.