A Message From God, Part 1

Have you ever thought what it would be like if God would give us the opportunity to have Him sit down in front of us and look at us in the eye and tell us exactly what He thinks of us? Kind of a scary proposition, isn't it? But in one way it would be nice, wouldn't it, to have God sit here, look us in the eye and say, here's the things that you're doing and what you can improve on, and here's where you're missing the mark big time. We face that sometimes in work, and it's helpful. People who are serious about their jobs when they get those annual reviews take that critique to heart. But what we're here for is a much bigger thing than any job that is on this earth. We're here because God has called us to be part of His kingdom. He's watching what we're doing, and we go through our lives, and we're supposed to be improving every year. At some point in our life, we committed to God. We told Him, we're going to follow you. We're going to live our lives the way that you created man to live them. We're going to believe in your promises, and we're going to let you change us and mold us into what you want us to become. And if we do that, God will give us those promises that we know, that we've talked about. But to those who fall short, it's going to be a harrowing day. So to be able to sit down with God and have Him say, this is what you need to do, this is where you need to shore up, would be a nice thing to have happen. He expects us to do that ourselves, and He does let us know where we have weaknesses and problems. If we pray to Him and we ask Him, and if we listen to those thoughts that come into our mind that say, that attitude you have toward that just isn't the right attitude, that one should be put away. Or those things that we do that we kind of know that that isn't what God would do or Jesus Christ would do, but it's just so fun or it's just so much a part of us that we just have a hard time picturing life without doing that. If we listen closely and if we pray seriously to God and fervently, He will let us know what we need to do. He'll show us where our weaknesses are and He'll bring us along, and just as He promised, He will perfect us and He will have us ready for His kingdom. If we listen and if we pay attention and if we hear Him speaking to us, but it would be nice. It would be nice. If He would send a messenger or if He would send someone to just talk to us and let us know that face-to-face. You know, back in the Old Testament times, as there was a people waiting for the first coming of Jesus Christ, God did send a messenger to them. He did talk to them and He did send them quite a critique of what they were doing.

The Jews at that time probably looked around and thought they were okay. They were keeping the Sabbath day. They were doing the offerings and the sacrifices just as God had commanded. They were probably paying their tithes and doing their offerings. But you know, when God sent this messenger to Him in a very forthright and a very no-holds-barred letter, He pretty much let them have it. And let them know, you are not at all doing what I expect of you. You're not at all keeping up your commitment to Me after the commitment I gave to you.

And throughout the Bible we find letters. Sometimes you can look at Proverbs. And when we read the first few chapters of Proverbs there, we look at that and it's written to Solomon says, "'My son, hear my instruction, listen to what I am saying, pay attention to my words, do this in your life and things will be well with you. But if you forget them or if you ignore them, things aren't going to go so well.'" God, Jesus Christ, writes seven letters to the churches of Revelation.

And in those letters He tells them what their strengths are and tells them what their weaknesses are. And those strengths and weaknesses are in every church and we can look at those and identify with some of them ourselves as we look at ourselves, if we look at ourselves honestly. But there's a book in the Old Testament, the last book of the Old Testament, where God sends a messenger to the Jews of that day to let them know what He thinks of the way they've been living their lives. You can be turning over to Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament.

Malachi was a prophet that was sent to Judah. And not much is known about the man. His name means my messenger. But he spoke boldly and he spoke very forthright. And in this book we can find a message to us just as much as it was a message to Judah at that time because Judah and us have very, very many similarities. Here was a people that thought they were obeying God, that knew the components of what He wanted them to do.

But God takes them to task in this book. And we're a people that's called out. God has opened our minds. He's given us the knowledge of what is right, what is wrong, what His plan is. And we're living that life. But Judah had become complacent. As we will see in this book, they become a little apathetic and they just didn't have the zeal for God that they maybe once had.

And the same thing can happen to us. They were waiting, and this was the last prophet sent to Judah before the first coming of Jesus Christ. We're waiting for the second coming of Jesus Christ, the return of Jesus Christ. And as we see things going on around us and as we watch the world pretty much go from, well, just make amazing leaps and bounds and changes that are going on, we can see that that day is drawing ever closer.

None of us know exactly when it's going to be. But it would behoove us all to really be looking at ourselves and using this book, this letter from God, as Him sitting down with you and me and telling us what's important to Him. And then us asking ourselves, are we doing what He wants us to do? So let's look at the book of Malachi here, beginning in verse 1 of chapter 1.

It says the burden, it really should be the oracle, of the Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. "'I have loved you,' says the Eternal." And we can stop right there. Look how God opens that up. "'I have loved you,' Israel." And whenever we're thinking about God and whatever we're deciding what to do, it's always a good thing to remember God loves us. And He first loved us. And that none of us would be here, none of us would have a future, none of us would have any idea what God's plan is if He hadn't opened our minds.

If Jesus Christ hadn't been willing to come to earth, live as a human, and die, none of us would have a future. It wouldn't even be a reason for us to be here. We owe it all to Him. He loved us all that much. And any time worth thinking and making choices as we go through this today, and as we go into our lives if we think, do we love God? Do we show God we love Him by every choice we make, by every action we take? "'I've loved you,' says the Lord." Now skip your finger there in Malachi. Let's turn back to Psalm 103.

Psalm 103 talks about God's benefits, and it's good to rehearse those all the time whenever we have the opportunity. Psalm 103, it's David writing. David came to appreciate everything about God. Psalm 103, verse 1, says, "'Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits. He forgives all your iniquities, and if He didn't, we'd all be dead men. He heals all your diseases when you have faith in Him. He redeems your life from destruction.' And where was our lives before God called us?

Where were we headed? What track were we on? He redeems our lives from destruction. He crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies. He satisfies your mouth with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagles.'" And we could list more and more of the things that God does for us. Drop down to verse 8, "'The eternal is merciful and gracious.' Where would we be without His mercy? Not one of us would be here if God wasn't merciful and patient with us. If He gave up on us just because we made a mistake, we'd all. None of us would be here today. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy." Verse 10, "'He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities.' We all deserve much worse than we receive in this life.

For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him." Now, there's a lot of things that we can be thankful to God for. And when we think about God, we should first be thankful to Him and recognize the love that He's had for us and the things that He's done for us. And as we go back to Malachi 1, we see that when God is speaking through Malachi to Israel there, He says, "'I have loved you.'" And then you can hear their response.

People that should know Him, and they say, "'Oh, in what way have you loved us? What have you done for us today, God? How exactly have you loved us?'" And then God responds, "'Well, wasn't Esau Jacob's brother? Yet Jacob I have loved. But Esau, he says, I have hated.'" Now, that can be a troublesome verse for some people.

"'Jacob I have loved.'" In the Old Testament, God was working with a group of people, one nation. And you remember the story of Jacob, so we don't have to go back through Genesis and recount all of that. Jacob made some mistakes in his life, some pretty big mistakes.

But you know, as he walked with God, and as he worked with God, and as he lived year by year by year, he grew closer and closer to God. He became more and more like Him. The mistakes of the youth were replaced by the faith of his older life. Whatever God told him to do, he did, and he demonstrated tremendous faith in God. God promises that when we obey Him, when we follow Him, when we give our lives to Him, when we reject self and follow Him, He'll bless us.

He'll love us, and when He loves us, the joy and all the fruits of the Spirit very much are a blessing to us. "'Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.'" Esau, on the other hand, didn't appreciate anything that God had given him. He had the birthright. He was the firstborn. He would have received the blessing. But what did Esau do with those blessings that God gave him? Well, as soon as he came home hungry, he was willing to sell that very important birthright for a bowl of soup.

What did that tell God? What should that have told his father? The things that you gave me just aren't that important to me. The first time I was hungry, I was willing to just cast that off because it just didn't mean that much to me, that birthright. And hey, a bowl of soup looked awfully good at that time because Esau had no respect for what God had given him by his birth order.

You know, God has given you and me a birthright as well. He's given us the opportunity to be firstborn in his kingdom. I don't think any of us really realize how important that is and what a blessing and what a gift that is. What would we trade that for? What would it take for us to say, eh, it's just not that important? Would it take an illness to say, eh, it's just not that important? Would it take financial difficulties? Now I'll trade that in. I'll trade that in for some momentary relief.

Would it take threats? Someone threatening us? Would we trade in the birthright because of that? Esau showed God by his actions. It just wasn't that important. As we go through our lives, we can keep in our minds, God has given us quite a bit, what are we telling him? How important what he gives us is. And when we disobey God, when we reject him, he withdraws his blessings. So when it says, Esau had hated it, he didn't hate him the way we think of the word, hate. God doesn't hate anyone, he loves everyone. But he withdrew his blessings from him. Jacob would be blessed, Esau he did not.

Esau I have hated and laid waste his mountains and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness. Even though Edom has said, we've been impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places. The good old human spirit. You know what? Even though God has done this to us, we're going to wield it right back. There's nothing going to hold us down. We can do it on our own. That's what Edom would say. We don't have to worry about that.

We didn't need the birthright, we didn't need the blessing. We can just do it all on our own and have everything that we want. Well, thus says the Lord of hosts, They may build, but I will throw down. They will be called the territory of wickedness, and the people against whom the eternal will have indignation forever. If God is for us, as Paul says in Romans 8, 28, or 31, no one can be against us. But if He's against us, nothing we do is going to turn out right. If we are constantly battling things, if we are constantly in a, like the hamster on the treadmill, just going around in circles in our lives and feeling like we're not making any progress, we want to stick it down on our knees and ask God, what am I doing?

Am I really showing you by my actions and choices that you are the most important thing in my life? You've loved me, am I loving you? Edom, Esau, never repented. You know, Jacob progressed throughout his life, but Esau never repented of what he did.

He realized what he did, but not once do we find in the Bible. Now, he was sorry for what he did, but he never repented. He never got down on his knees before God and said, I reject the way that I was. I'm sorry, literally sorry, and now I'm turning back from my way to you.

He never did that. And so all the human spirit in the world will never overcome God's spirit. It's God's spirit that overcomes the human spirit, our spirit that would like to rise up against God, but teaches us and causes us to be able to yield to Him. Verse 5, "'Your eyes shall see, and you shall say, The Lord is magnified beyond the border of Israel.'" God's working with a small group of people now. He's working with you and me, not the whole world. But there's coming a time when the whole world will know who God is. There's coming a time when the whole world will know that God's way is the only way to life, happiness, peace, prosperity, and eternity.

He will be the king of the whole world, even though the world looks to see or tries to ignore Him and relegate Him far, far down the list on importance today. And then, after this introductory part, God begins to talk to Israel and Judah a little more directly. Verse 6, "'A son honors his father.' Sons may have issues with their fathers during their life, but you know the Fifth Commandment tells us to honor your father and mother." And that word, honor, when you look at it in the Hebrew, carries a lot of weight.

It literally means and has the context of heavy, that that person is a heavyweight in your life. Mom and dad, even though they may not have treated you right in your eyes, you respect them. You show them honor. They're up above some of the other people in your life. And God is our Father. Look what He's done for us. Look at everything that He's provided. Look at everything that He promises, and He's capable of doing it.

And He will do it. A son honors his father and a servant his master. We all respect our bosses, at least to their face, right? And when our boss tells us to do something, we do it. That is, if we want to keep that job. He says, you be here at 9 o'clock on Monday morning for a meeting. If you want that job, you're going to be there at 9 o'clock on Monday morning. Probably leave a little bit early to make sure you're not caught up in traffic or anything else. Because we respect Him. We honor Him.

We know that He's an important person in our life who can give us a job or take it away. A son honors his father and a servant honors his master. And then God says, if then I'm the father, if I've provided all this for you, if I've provided life, if I've provided these blessings, if I've opened your mind, if I've given you the keys to the kingdom and the church to the keys to the kingdom, if I promise these things that I'm going to give you eternal life, He says, where's my honor?

Where's my honor? And if I'm a master, where's my reverence? You respect these people out here, but when it comes to me, you're very, very carefree. If I say something, if you feel like doing it, you do. He's telling his people. It doesn't carry the weight. When I say something that your baby physical father tells you to do or your boss tells you to do, where's my honor? Where's my reverence? I've given you a whole book of a way of life here, but Israel, Judah, God's chosen people of the 21st century.

Where's my honor? What are you doing? If I ask you to do something, do you do it? Where's my honor? Where's my reverence as the eternal of hosts to you priests who despise my name? You know when God tells us to do something, He expects it to be done just that way. Now sometimes we may look at things and think, well, why do we have to do that? Is that really important to God?

Does He really care if I miss the Sabbath service because I'm a little tired because I had a tough week at work? Does He really care if I miss a day or a week of prayer? Does He really care if I put something else or do something else that I know I should be doing and that I shouldn't be doing instead of what I'm doing? Does He really care as long as I'm doing right most of the time? Isn't that okay? If I show up most of the time for Sabbath services, then often I use Sabbath services because that's the thing that we all do, right?

That's the one place that we all see each other every week. But there's so many other things during the week where we come before God, not to minimize Sabbath services because He does command that we come before Him. There were some people in the Old Testament that didn't take seriously the things that God said. You know, He tells us everything in this book, everything in the Bible sitting in your laps, we should know it, and we should live by every word of it.

Not most of the words in it, not the ones that we really agree with, but every word of it. And when we live by every word of it, that means there's some things about us that have to change.

Some things about us and our personalities that may have to be thrown out. And some things that we need God's Holy Spirit and to call on Him and use that Holy Spirit to get away of the problems, the things that separate us from God. Not just sin, but some of the weaknesses, the faults, and the proclivities that we have. We need to pay attention to every word. We need to pay attention when God comes knocking on our heads and saying in the thought, you know, that isn't really the way, you know, that isn't really the attitude, you know, that isn't really the thought that you should have.

There were some people that didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the detail of what God had to say, and they paid dearly. Let's go back to Leviticus 10. Leviticus 10 speaks of two young men who had the responsibility of working in God's temple. And you remember, as you read through Exodus and as you read through Leviticus, the detail that God gave about His temple.

This is exactly how things should be set up. Here's exactly how the utensils should be made. Here's exactly how you should dress when you go into the temple each day. And God expected those things to be done exactly the way that He said, not 99% of them, but 100% of them. And when Moses, under God's direction, led the people to build a tabernacle, He said of them, they did everything exactly the way that I wanted them to do.

But here we come to Leviticus 10, and we find a couple of young men who were going about their duties, and they're careless in what they do. Chapter 10, verse 1, They dab in a bayou, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it, put incense on it, and offered profane, or strange fire, before the eternal, which he had not commanded them. He didn't command them. They did it differently than what God had told them to do. Now keep your finger there in chapter 10. Let's go back to chapter 6 of Leviticus and see the fire that God wanted them to use. Chapter 6 and verse 12. The fire on the altar, He said, shall be kept burning, it shall not be put out.

The priest shall burn wood on it every morning, and lay the burnt offering and order on it, and he shall burn on it the fat of the peace offerings. A fire shall always be burning on the altar, it shall never go out. And when the priests were going to get fire, that's the fire they were to use for the burnt offerings.

Not just light a match, get their lighter out, and think any old fire will do. And in these young men's minds, somewhere along the line, they thought, as long as the burnt offering gets burnt, what difference does it make where the fire came from? Is it really that important? And we flip back to chapter 10. We found out it was really important to God in verse 2 of chapter 10. So fire went out from the eternal and devoured them, and they died right there before God.

They made one mistake. They didn't follow God's instructions exactly the way He said to. Now, humanly speaking, we would say, oh, really? They still were going about the practice. And you can see in the verses here that Aaron understandably might have been a little upset, and Moses told him, calm down. This is what God has decided.

He was making a point to the priests. You do it exactly the way I said. You don't compromise. You don't make replacements. You don't take it upon yourself. You do it exactly the way I said to do it. And if you're going to serve me, that's what you need to do. Every word, every concept. Now, none of us do it perfectly now, and we could be very thankful to God.

He doesn't strike us all down because none of us would be here. We'd all be gone. But over the course of our lives, the years, the decades that we follow God, He expects us to become a little more perfect, a little more blameless each year. In Matthew 548, Christ says, become perfect or become blameless, just as your Father in heaven is perfect. That's what the goal is. That's what the people who will be in the millennium is. That's who will be teaching as kings and priests in the millennium. That's what we're preparing for right now.

And we better be taking it seriously, what God says.

Or when that time comes and He gathers those who have been paying attention to Him, who have been learning to have been allowing the Holy Spirit to leave them, they'll be there with Him. And for others, there will be, as we said a few weeks ago, weeping and gnashing of teeth when they realize we wasted time. We just didn't pay attention. We just didn't think it was that important.

Let's look at another one over in 1 Chronicles 13. Another story we know. This is a story when David is wanting to bring the ark back to Jerusalem. And he gathers some people. They appropriately put it on the cart, and they begin on their way back. And they go along fine until we come to 1 Chronicles 13, verse 9. It says, And when they came to Chidin's threshing floor, Uzzah, the man Uzzah, put out his hand to hold the ark. For the oxen stumbled.

He did what came naturally, any of us carrying that precious of cargo. If we thought about the fall, we would put our hands out automatically and stop it.

But when he did that, it says, The anger of the Lord, verse 10, was aroused against Uzzah, and he struck him because he put his hand to the ark, and he died there before God.

All he did was come naturally, and he died because he touched the ark.

David was angry at first. I'm doing this to please you, God. And all he did was try to keep that ark from falling, and you let him die? You kill him because he touched it? What were we to do?

But you see, later, David was afraid. David knew they had made some mistake. There was some detail that they hadn't thought of, something that they didn't do before they prepared to move that ark.

And Uzzah paid dearly with his life because David didn't prepare.

When we have bad things happen in our lives consistently, the same thing happening over and over and over, we might want to go back and review our life through God's eyes, through the words of the Bible, and see what are we doing? And ask God, what am I missing? What detail am I missing? How am I not living the way that you want me to, that this happens to me over and over again. Now, when he reveals it, we need to be prepared to change, just like David changed. Let's go back a couple chapters forward here in chapter 15.

David leaves the ark there. He goes back, but then a couple chapters later, he's ready to move the ark again. Chapter 15, verse 1. David built houses for himself in the city of David, and he prepared a place for the ark of God and pitched a tent for it.

And then he said, No one may carry the ark of God but the Levites, for the eternal has chosen them to carry the ark of God and to minister before him forever. And then he gathered all of Israel together, and in verse 11 he called for the priests. He called for Zadok and Abiathar the priests and for the Levites. And he said to them, verse 12, You are the heads of the father's house of the Levites. Sanctify yourselves, you and your brethren, that you may bring up the Lord, the ark of the Lord God of Israel, to the place I have prepared for it. Now we're going to move it. For because you did not do it the first time, the Lord our God broke out against us because we didn't consult him about the proper order. Only the Levites. David missed that detail as they paid for it with his life. But David knew something was wrong. David went back. He went to the Word of God and he found out what the proper order was, and then he did it. He showed respect for God. It was that important to God that it be done the way that God said it should be done.

He's always looking for what's in our hearts. He's looking to see, will we do things the way that he says it should be done? What are our hearts? What are our attitudes? What will we do?

Let's go back to Malachi.

We were in verse 6. Let's read down a few verses here.

You say, at the end of verse 6, In what way have we despised your name?

Well, we haven't done things the way you've said to do. And God answers them, You offer defiled food on my altar. But you say, Well, in what way have we defiled you?

And you answer, The table of the Lord is contemptible. When you offer the blind as a sacrifice, isn't it evil? When you offer the lame and sick, isn't it evil?

Do things and give me the honor and respect as your master and as your father. Do things the right way, but give me the best you have to give. You know when God gave the offerings, the instructions for the offerings, He didn't tell them, Just bring the animal that you don't care about.

Just offer that to me. That's good enough. Now, He said, You bring the best. You bring the unblemished male. You bring the firstborn, not the sixth or seventh or eighthborn when you have the first six or seven for yourself. And what they were doing here in Israel and Judah, they were just bringing whatever they didn't really want. They were going through the motions. They were doing the sacrifices, but they weren't the sacrifices that God would want. Times remind you of Cain, doesn't it? When God looked at Cain's and Abel's offerings, one of them was exactly the way God had wanted. He looked at the heart and He saw Abel. What you put into that offering was all of you. Cain, you just gave me what was left over. It didn't affect you at all. And that's what the people of Israel and Judah were doing here.

You know, we can do the same thing. We don't offer sacrifices today, but we offer ourselves, don't we?

We offer ourselves when we come to Sabbath services.

You know, I feel sometimes I talk about it too much, but the more I read the Bible, and I think about what God is preparing for us and what He's looking out of us, I think if we can't get ourselves to Sabbath services every single week, what are we telling God? We're telling Him, this is more important than you, this is more important, eye appointments, family. What is more important to you than God?

Now, when we commit actions, when we make decisions, when we do things like that, what we're telling God is, you're just not as important as this. It was more important for me to do this today than to come before you, even though you commanded. Now, honestly, if we look at this, do we really think God is going to have someone in His kingdom, that He's going to have working with Jesus Christ under Him as a king and priest? Is He going to have someone with that attitude? No, He's not. Now, I know there's illnesses, and I know there's times that we shouldn't be at services, but I really can't think of anything—and I hate to use the word, but I can't come up with another one—I can't think of anything easier to do than be at Sabbath services every week. If we are at all serious about God's calling, and if we can't do that, then I think we really need to look at ourselves in the mirror and say, God, I just don't consider you that important. What about the time that we pray? Do we give God the best of the time? Do we pray when we get up in the morning when we're alert and awake? Or do we wait until the end of the day and realize, ah, I had so much to do that day, my boss wanted me there early, and so I didn't have time to pray? And as we kneel there by our bedside and in our closet and our eyes are drooping, we think, well, you know what? At least I got the prayer in. God understands. Did we give Him the best? Or did we give Him the defiled lamb? If we do the Bible study in the same way, read in bed and, hey, you know what? It puts me right to sleep.

Do you think that God is honored with that? What are we telling God when we do those things?

Do we give Him the best? Or do we give Him the leftovers? Hey, God, I believe in You. I want what You have to offer, but you know what? You're going to be down the list a little bit. All these other things are more important to me than You. And yet, we believe, don't we? His promises? We believe, don't we, that He's preparing us to be kings and priests? We do believe, don't we, that His Holy Spirit is here preparing us for eternity and that we better learn the life now if we're going to teach it in the future? You know, when I was reading this section here, an old hymn came to my mind, and some of you who have been in the church a long time will remember this hymn. It's called, Give of Your Best to the Master. Remember that song? And I went to the Internet and I found the lyrics to it. Let me read some of the lyrics to that song.

It says, Give of your best to the master. Give of the strength of your youth.

Throw your soul's fresh, glowing ardor into the battle for truth. Jesus has set the example, Dauntless was he young and brave. Give him your loyal devotion. Give him the best that you have.

Given to you will be given. God his beloved Son gave. He gave the best for us, and he expects no less out of us. God his beloved Son gave. Greatfully seeking to serve him, give him the best that you have. Give of your best to the master. Naught else is worthy his love. He gave himself for your ransom. Gave up his glory above.

Laid down his life without murmur. You from sin's ruin to save.

Give him your heart's adoration. Give him the best that you have.

If you look down at verse 8, God says, at the end of verse 8, He says, You do all these things to me. You don't ever give me the best. You go through the motions, but you give me the weak, the blind, the lame, the things that you don't want. And He says, If it's so great, offer it to your governor. Would you do that to him?

Or someone who's important to you? If your boss was coming over to dinner, would you just serve him leftovers and think, eh, I just pulled something out of the refrigerator we had a couple nights ago and serve it to him? Of course not. You give him the best that you have. And God is saying, where's my honor? Where's my reverence? Do you give me the best that you have?

Of your time, of yourself, of your mind? Do you give me the best? Offer it to your governor. Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you favorably?

God asks us as He sits down face to face with you and me. Would you give to your boss? Would you give to your whatever important person is in your life? Would you handle him or her the same way you handle me? It's a good self-examination question. And then he says in verse 9, but entreat God's favor, that he may be gracious to us. Let's drop down to verse 12. You profane all the things that we do. In that you say, the table of the Lord is defiled. It's fruit. It's food. It's contemptible. We don't even like what we're having to do. And you say, oh, what a weariness! Really? God expects us to do that every single week?

He expects us to pray and have contact and communicate with Him every single day? What weariness does that? I've read this Bible through before. I have to read it through again, or I should be coming up with something to study again?

That's what the people back then were saying. This is a weariness. We're tired of doing this.

Are we tired of doing it? Now, I should say that I know many of you sacrifice a lot to be here on Sabbath. I know that the drive is hard for some, and I know that economic times are tough, and gas isn't cheap. And I appreciate that you, more importantly, God appreciates that you've put Him at such importance that you would give of your money and your time to do that. But, you know, that's what He wants to see. What's in our hearts? Are we just going through the motions, or do we really do it because we love God and because we really, really trust in Him and believe in the promises that He has given us? Well, let's move into chapter 2 here, because as God talks to them and talks to you and me face-to-face about how important He is, He goes into another part here in chapter 2, something we can look at. He says, And now, O priests, this commandment is for you. Now, remember, we're all in training to be priests.

So when He talks about priests here, He's talking to you and me as well. And now, O priests, this commandment is for you. If you won't hear, and if you won't take it to heart to give glory to my name, I'll send a curse on you. I'll curse your blessings. Yes, I have cursed them already because you don't take it to heart. The priests in ancient Israel were there to administer the temple, to teach the people, to keep them apprised of what God wanted. They did God's work. That's what you and I are called to be. That's what we're going to be doing in the millennium.

But you know, they got to the point where they became a little dull of hearing.

God again would knock. He would tell them, this is what you need to do. It's a real prophet or someone else, but they would just kind of ignore it. They wouldn't take it to heart. They wouldn't make a change in their lives, and they wouldn't really change the order of what they were doing. They just decided, hey, things go on, and God should be pleased with the fact that things are going the way they are. And He says, you know, I bless people who obey me, but I will send a curse on you if you fail to give glory to my name, if you fail or continue to fail to give me the credence and the reverence that I deserve. And it gets a little graphic down here in verse three, but He's making a point. He says, Behold, I'll rebuke your descendants. I'll spread refuse on your faces, the refuse of your solemn face, where they sacrificed animals and some not so pleasant parts came out of those animals, and one will take you away with it.

I will continue to knock on your door. I will continue to try to wake you up.

I will try whatever it can to get you to the point where you're listening to me.

Then you will know that I have sent this commandment to you, that my covenant with Levi may continue, says the eternal of hosts. My covenant was with him, one of life and peace. My covenant was with him. He had a unique place in Israel to do God's work, and there was a lot expected of him, and he had to keep his faith in God and his job it was to make sure, as we'll see here in the next few verses, to teach the truth of God and to make sure that nation was headed in the right direction in concert with the king who administered the physical affairs. Let's go back for a moment to Numbers 25 and see where God talks about this covenant of peace, because there is one priest in particular that he mentions, this covenant of peace Numbers 25. As we come to Numbers 25, we find Israel.

Balak and Balaam have successfully lured Israel into idolatry, into marrying foreign women, into looking at the nations around them and forgetting God. Let me read through here sections of verses 1 through 13 to see what happened and then what God, to see what happened to one one priest or what he did, that God made this covenant of peace. It says, Israel remained in Acacia Grove and the people began to commit harlotry with the women of Moab. They invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods and the people ate and bowed down to their gods. So Israel was joined to Baal of Peor and the anger of the eternal was aroused against Israel. And then God said to Moses, Take all the leaders of the people and hang the offenders before the Lord out in the sun that the fierce singer of God may turn away from Israel. Take those offenders, kill them in front of the people. So Moses said to the judges of Israel, Every one of you, kill his men who were joined to Baal of Peor. And indeed, one of the children of Israel came and presented to his brother and a Midianite woman in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel who were weeping at the door of the tabernacle of meeting.

Now when Phineas, the son of Eliezer, the son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he rose from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand. And he went after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through the man of Israel and the woman through her body.

So the plague was stopped among the children of Israel, and those who died in the plague were 24,000.

And then in the next verses, God commends Phineas. He says, Phineas, the son of Eliezer, has turned back my wrath from the children of Israel because he was zealous with my zeal among them so that I didn't consume the children of Israel in my zeal. Therefore say, Behold, I give to him my covenant of peace, and it will be to him in his descendants for an everlasting priesthood. You see the zeal that Phineas had? 24,000 people died in that plague. God kept knocking, saying, Don't do it. Hang these men who are doing this. Israel just didn't get it. It took the zeal of a priest, something God's preparing you for and preparing me for, to stop the sin in Israel, to stop that part that didn't honor him. The children of Israel forgot who their God was. They were all too willing to give their loyalty, to give their time, to give their bodies, to give their substance and their worship to another God.

And it was Phineas who said, No more. We're ending it here. And God commended him for it.

In our lives, we better have the zeal to look at ourselves and say, Enough is enough.

We're not going to do that anymore. We're not going to be defined by that anymore.

God gave us the Spirit to overcome our weaknesses and our faults.

And it's time to develop that zeal again. You know, back when we were all baptized, we all committed to God. We committed to Him that we would follow Him for eternity, that we would give ourselves to Him, that we wanted His Holy Spirit in Him, and that we would yield to Him so that He could change us and weed us out and perfect us. And that was a commitment that was made not just for this life, but for eternal life. And we had zeal back then. We didn't have zeal. We wouldn't have ever gotten to the point of baptism. But how many of us still have that zeal? How many of us are still very in tune with what God wants? Very in tune with weeding out the old, taking out the unleavened parts of us and letting God replace them with the leavened parts and replacing it with the unleavened parts.

He wants that zeal. Now, in another letter back in Revelation, you'll remember the letter to the church in Ephesus. This was the church that was becoming complacent, a church that was becoming apathetic, a church that was kind of just drifting along thinking everything was okay and that they were just right with God. Do you remember what he said to them?

He said, you've lost your first love. Go back and get your first love. Repent and ask God for it. And if you don't get your first love back, then he's going to take away the promise of the kingdom from them.

He wants people who are zealous for his will, his way, his life. And if God was sitting down, face to face with me, he'd say, you'd better become a little more zealous.

I dare say, for some of you, he would be saying the same thing. You'd better get the zeal back.

You'd better get your focus back on where it needs to be if you really love me, if you really believe what I'm offering you, if you really want to be part of the kingdom.

Because Israel, at this time, to whom God also made great promises, they could have been the model nation, but they consistently showed God what he wanted and what he promised just wasn't that important to them. Now, they didn't have the Holy Spirit like we do. Let's go back to Malachi.

We were in verse 5. Let's pick it up in verse 6.

Speaking of the priests that were then, speaking of the priests that you and I are being prepared to be, God says the law of truth was in his mouth. Injustice was not found on his lips.

He walked with me in peace and equity, and he turned many away from iniquity.

They knew the Word of God. They taught the Word of God. They expected people to live by the Word of God. For the lips of a priest should keep knowledge, and people should seek the law from his mouth. For he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts, the messenger, the teacher that you will be, the teacher that all of us are, to one degree or another today.

You know, in James 3, verse 1, it says, not many of you should desire to be teachers, because to them is the greater condemnation. And I look at that verse, and I take that verse very seriously. I would rather God would strike me dead now than to ever mislead one of you or anyone.

But all of you are teachers in one way or another. We're all preparing for that.

We can teach each other and influence each other by the examples that we set.

We can teach each other by the words that we say in private conversation.

In Titus 2, it says, older men teach the younger men, teach them how to behave, how to have reverence. Do we tolerate sin in our midst by our examples and by the way we teach others through how we talk, through the comments we might make about each other or things? Do we teach people it's okay to disrespect? Do we teach people that it's okay to give maybe not your best to God, but your second best to God? You know, sitting here today, as in every church of God, there are some new people. And they watch what I do. They're watching what you do. Just when I came to the church, I watched what people did. And if I saw them doing things, I would think, ah, if they do that, I can do that. If they're too tired on Sabbath morning or Sabbath afternoon to come to church, then you know what? If I'm too tired, it's probably okay for me to do that too.

If there's something more important to do, that whatever God asks us to do, people watch. It's incumbent upon all of us to be letting our light shine, to be doing and living what God says. Now, none of us are perfect, and I'll make mistakes, and you'll make mistakes. But I'm saying we all better be learning, because God is watching. And I don't know if we'll get the verse today, looking at the time, but we'll see a verse later where God ponders our paths. He looks and sees how we handle these responsibilities that He gives us.

And His response and His calling is a tremendous responsibility.

And He's looking to see, how are they handling that? Are they teaching the right thing?

Are they listening when I knock? Are they going back and searching the scriptures, and then doing what I ask them to do?

Titus 2, not to leave the ladies out, also says older women teach the younger women. We're all teachers, and all our lips should be keeping knowledge.

Verse 8, But you've departed, he says to the priests from the way. You've caused many to stumble at the law.

You've corrupted the covenant of Levi, says the eternal of hosts.

You've been taking too many liberties with my law. You've been teaching people that it's okay to do this and that. You haven't been teaching right from my word. You've become complacent. You've become apathetic. You've been changing things, and we do not change one thing from what God writes in His Bible.

We follow Him implicitly. Therefore, he says in verse 9, I have made you contemptible and based before all the people, because you have not kept my ways, but have shown partiality in the law.

You've broken my covenant, he said. You broke the commitment that you made to me.

You told me when you were baptized, I will follow you implicitly. I will follow you eternally. I will do your will.

I will change, and I will let you write on me a new mind and a new heart.

And the old way of doing things was buried. There's a new way of doing things, God's way.

God says, you told me that. You committed to me that you would do that. What happened?

Time, years, the delay of Christ's coming. If you want to look at the delay of His Christ's coming, He says, we can't live that way. We need to start seeing ourselves a little bit more through the eyes that God sees us with. Because every choice and every action that we make, He looks, He watches.

Are they doing what I ask them to do? Are they going through the motions half-heartedly, or are they really with me, whole heart, mind, and soul? Are they really growing, or are they just treading water out there? Did they remember the commitment they gave me, or are they just kind of going off in a different direction just a little bit, and thinking that all is okay, patting on themselves on the back and saying, all's okay? There's one way to salvation, only one way, and only one Spirit that will lead us there.

You know, in 1 Corinthians 8, I won't turn there. You can write down 1 Corinthians 8, verses 9 through 13 and Mark 9, 42. It talks about stumbling blocks. You know, none of us want to be stumbling blocks. God condemns stumbling blocks.

And to Judah and Israel and Jeremiah, if you remember, when they consistently went against them, he wrote them a certificate of divorce. None of us want to be divorced by God.

If we remember to honor Him, if we remember to give Him the reverence, if we really put Him first place, as the first commandment says, if we really do what He asks us to do, He'll be pleased. But if we don't, well, I keep going back to there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

And he says in verse 9 here, I've made you contemptible and base before all the people, because, priests, you've done this and you've caused many to stumble at the law.

I'll make you contemptible and base before all the people, because you've not kept my ways, but have shown partiality in the law. For those people who find themselves, what a tragic day! There's not even a word that we can define it. But we have the time now to correct the course that we may or may not be on.

We have God looking at us through this book, sitting us down and looking at me in the face and looking at you in the face and saying, is this you? Are you as committed as you were x-axis years ago? Are you as committed this year as you were last year?

A lot we can think about. Do we still have the same commitment to God?

Well, as we go on in the chapter, he talks about another commitment that we make in our lives that tells him something about us as well. I can see we're not going to have the time to get to that today, but let's read verses 10 to 12, and then we will end there and pick it up again next week. Have we not, he says in verse 10, all one Father? Have we not all the same God who's made us the same promises who has given us everything? Have we not all one Father? Hasn't one God created us? Then why do we deal treacherously with one another? By profaning the covenant of the Fathers, Judah has dealt treacherously, an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem. For Judah has profaned the Lord's holy institution which he loves. He's married the daughter of a foreign God. May the Lord cut off from the sense of Jacob the man who does this, being awake and aware, yet who brings an offering to the Lord of hosts.

Who knows what he's doing but still comes before God and acts like nothing is wrong.

Well, let's end there and pick it up next week. But as you review what we've talked about today, and as you read through the book of Malachi, the rest of it, just remember this book is your opportunity to sit down face to face with God. Let him talk to you. Let him show you your weaknesses.

Don't be dull of hearing. Don't think that's not me when he comes knocking. Make sure that we're doing the things that God wants because we all want each other to be in his kingdom.