Auto Generated Transcript
If you brought a Bible and you want to tune in to the last place we’re going to look at together. Um, we are in the very last book of the Old Testament. So that’s kind of fitting, isn’t it? We’re we’re in the book called Malachi. Some of us like to purposefully mispronounce that and call it the greatest Italian prophet, Malachi. That would be me, right? Um, you come to me asking for that’s Malachi, right? The Italian prophet, last book of your Bible. So turn there and we’ll study this book together by way of history. So you understand, the last three books of the Bible are well, in chronological order, though, though the Old Testament last three books of the Old Testament, I should say, fall in chronological order, though the Old Testament isn’t necessarily given to us in chronological order. There are some books that follow that sequence, and the last three books of your Bible the Minor Prophets, um, Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi. They they follow the last events in Israel’s history as Israel’s come back from the Babylonian captivity. And so we’ve we’ve looked at this together. Israel became a nation through Moses. Then Joshua led them into the promised Land, came, became a prominent nation, ruled by judges, and eventually led to kings. Three kings led the nation until the kingdom was split into southern and northern tribes. The northern tribes called the tribes of Ephraim or Israel. Southern tribes taken the name of Judah.
The North never had a godly king. God sent them into captivity and 722 BC by the Assyrians in the south. They continued on, had a few godly kings. Finally, in their disobedience, God took them into captivity under the Babylonians. In 586 BC, God told them they would be in Babylon as captives for 70 years. At the end of 70 years, the Babylonians were conquered by the Persians. King Darius and Cyrus issued decrees to release the nation of Israel, to go back to their promised land and the place that God had called them, to re-establish them as a people and rebuild the the temple that had been destroyed. Those stories take place in Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. The historical account of God leading his people back to the Promised Land after the Babylonian captivity. The first six chapters of Ezra deal with immediately after the 70 years when the decree was issued for the nation of Israel to go back in between chapter six and chapter seven of Ezra, there’s a break in between that break. The story of Esther takes place after the story of Esther takes place. Chapter seven then continues the Exodus from Babylon back to Israel to continue to build the nation. Ezra leaves on that trip in the second half of the book while they’re rebuilding the temple. God then leads Nehemiah back to the nation of Israel to build the wall around Jerusalem, to protect the people accomplishing it within.
Within a couple of months, they were able to reestablish the wall. They considered it miraculous. During that time, once again, the nation of Israel reestablished themselves under God. Get to a place where they start walking in disobedience to him. You would think after all they’ve been through and all the destruction they’ve seen due to their disobedience, that the nation of Israel at one point would get it right. But then again, so would I. Just as I look at them and may point the finger. I can look at my own life and think I know right from wrong, I know good from evil. And no matter how many times I tell myself something may be wrong, the sinfulness within me rears its ugly head and I do things contrary to the nation of God. And so God sends these final three prophets to the nation of Israel to to speak to them. And Malachi comes by way of the last prophet for the nation of Israel around 430 BC. As rule begins to stray from God. Malachi becomes the last attempt of God speaking to the nation of Israel to turn them back to him before God eventually just goes silent to the nation of Israel. Josephus, a first century historian on on the Jewish people. He was a Jew himself. Records for the nation of Israel between 400 BC to the coming of Jesus as as the silent years. God chose not to speak. And God is no longer going to speak after Malachi comes to conclusion until the coming of John the Baptist.
He wasn’t a Baptist, but he baptized, right? And leaves us with this curiosity. God’s final prophet. God’s last message to his people. What does he say? Knowing that there are wandering from him one more time in a last ditch approach to prophetically proclaim to them what they need to hear to turn their hearts back to him. What is it God says? If you turn in your Bibles, you can follow along. In chapter one. We’ll have it up on the screen out of curiosity and just understanding. If in your final last words, let me just ask. And knowing that you’re with someone that you care and love and appreciate that you’re not going to see them for 400 years or for quite a while. What would be your last words? Someone that you care about. You’re concerned for. God’s final words to the nation of Israel was one of love. He says in Malachi chapter one and verse two, I have loved you. I think we’ve been maybe to this place, or some of us can relate to the place of God’s statement. In just the opening phrase, I, I’ve loved you. In knowing. In relationships we experience tension. Maybe you as a parent can even think of children that have just lived lifestyles that are just unhealthy, and your heart’s desire is just to see them come to, to to grow in the relationship with you and to turn away from those things that are so harmful from them.
But you know, that relationship is just causing such grievous pain within the family. And here in this passage, God’s about to release this relationship with Israel, but he wants to give this last thought before he just goes silent. And he says to them, guys, I’ve loved you. From the beginning of the Old Testament to the end of the Old Testament. To the end of the New Testament. God’s plan of redemption for mankind. As man has turned their backs on him, God has been passionately pursuing us, that we may know him and grow in him for all of eternity. And once again he shares that message. Guess I’ve loved you. As you’re straying from me again, don’t go get nervous about the fact that you. You may perceive that I hate you. You could think coming back from Babylon. We’ve we’ve left God. How is God going to receive us? What’s God going to respond to us? We’ve allowed us temple to be destroyed. Does he? Does he hate us? And he said, no, that’s that’s not even close to the message I’ve begun to proclaim to you. I want to know you, and for you to know me and us. To walk in that relationship together. I, I have loved you. When he gives a comparison illustration to the nation of Israel between Jacob and Esau.
Uh, Esau and Jacob were were twins born at the same time. God had an opportunity from Isaac to choose through which nation or which person he would grow the nation to bring the Messiah to bless all nations. And he chose Jacob over Esau. And so it goes on and says, this I have loved you, says the Lord. But you ask, how have you loved us? And he says, was not Esau Jacob’s brother? Declares the Lord. Yet I have loved Jacob, but Esau I have hated. I have turned his hill country into a wasteland, and left his inheritance to desert jackals. I would say when when God’s talking about hate in this passage, it’s not hatred towards Esau. As a matter of fact, in Genesis 33 nine, there comes a place where Jacob’s offering things to Esau, and Esau says to Jacob, no, I’ve been blessed beyond belief. I don’t need anything from you. God has certainly provided for my life. But what it’s saying in comparison in this passage is that when when God chooses us, that that his acceptance looks like rejection to other people. But God has lavished his love and and elected or chosen Jacob for the particular task of revealing himself and blessing all nations through him. In Luke chapter 14, Jesus gave similar thought to this passage. It says this if anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even their own life, such a person cannot be my disciple.
And what Jesus is doing for us is dividing the line between worship of him and acceptance of other things. Jesus isn’t just something in addition to the shelf of our life. Jesus takes preeminence in all things over our lives. And coincidentally. And learning to give our lives to him. I would propose we learn to love others more deeply because of him. When it comes to those relationships that we set aside to embrace Christ. Because of that relationship with Christ, we learn to embrace others with a type of love that Jesus displayed to us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ loved us. Jesus gave the illustration another way in Matthew, rather than referring to Haiti, he says this in Matthew ten anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. Anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Jesus doesn’t rob you from those relationships that you can’t enjoy those relationships. Jesus draws you from those relationships so he can transform your heart so that through him you might better love others because of what Christ has done in you. And in this passage, God is demonstrating his love and saying, listen, Israel, from the beginning my hand has been all over you, demonstrating the love that I have for you. I’ve chosen you. But you may know me and enjoy me forever.
He goes on in chapter three and verse six and a like mindedness of the same verse, he says this I, the Lord, do not change. So you, the descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed. Ever since the time of your ancestors, you have turned away from my decrees and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord Almighty. What God is referencing in this passage of Scripture is something we refer to in the Bible as a covenantal love that he has expressed. When God called Abraham. If you remember from the story that we shared, God set a covenant with Abraham. And during the time of Abraham, when a covenant was established, God, God would find that people would kill an animal and and they would separate this animal that they killed. And when two people walked in agreement of a covenant, they would pass between the middle of this animal that laid separated, saying to one another, if we break this covenant, let what happens to this animal happen to me? And God tells Abraham, Abraham, I want to establish a covenant with you to display my great name to you as a nation. I have chosen you to love you and lavish my love upon you and through you. Bless all nations. So, so kill these animals. Separate them that we may pass through in the Bible tells us that when when it came time to pass through these animals, that God allowed a deep sleep to fall upon Abraham, and so that God alone was the one who walked through the animals, establishing the covenant with the nation of Israel.
Saying to Israel this covenant. Rests upon me. Israel. I will always love you. And in this passage he reminds. I, the Lord, am not changing on this. That’s the reason you’ve not been consumed. That rather than justice, I have chosen grace and I have chosen mercy on your behalf. Jesus offers Israel the understanding of his love in this passage of Scripture, so that we, as people who have been embraced by Christ, can walk in confident security with him. You think about relationships in your life that aren’t that are unhealthy. When someone of dominant position lords over you and and domineer over you and places fear upon you how you might respond to that relationship, there’s this timidness to even want to encounter it. But when it comes to Christ, his hand is this my mercy and grace have been extended. You need to know where I stand and how I feel toward you. That you may walk in confidence security by just drawing near to me. And I get to the end of this section and reading God’s response to Israel. And I have to say as, as I recount these words, Israel, it’s a covenant in Israel of always love you. You can’t help but think that it just it just rips at the heart.
To know the repetition of what God has said throughout all of Scripture to us. Come to me. What I have to offer is far greater than what this world could ever hope to give to you. Come to me. The hope that you’re discovering on your own apart from me, isn’t real hope. I just want to extend that to you. Come to me because you think what you have is best. But what I have is far better than anything you could experience. Just. Just come to me. And throughout the Old Testament, God has expressed it to Israel. And here again is God’s going silent to the nation. He gives this final cry to them, saying, just come to me. I had a friend this past week say to me, he serves in an inner city. He said, um, uh, you know, he’s around drugs all the time. He says he calls God the greatest hope dealer in the world. That was great. He he is the greatest hope dealer life has to offer. And so are the people who walk in the hope that he offers towards us. When we talk about pursuing God. And Jesus also reminds us in this passage of Scripture that the way that God desires is that we give him everything. He says in verse 18, and you will again see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between those who serve God and those who don’t or who do not.
Meaning there’s two places you can walk in relationship to God with him or against him. There’s no middle ground. When you’re walking in relationship with God, it tends to sometimes be like a roller coaster. Ups and downs. And in that relationship, it works like this. You’re either drawing near to God or further from God, but you’re not staying in the middle. There is a distinction between the wickedness and the righteousness. The difference between being a follower of Jesus and refusing to follow him. And when Jesus calls us in his love, what he calls us to do is pursue him with everything that we are. If we went back to Malachi one. I know we’re skipping between these chapters. It’s it says in verse six, a son honors his father and a slave his master. If I am a father, where is the honor? Do me? If I am a master, where is the respect? Do me, says the Lord Almighty. It is your priest who shows contempt for my name. But you ask, how have you shown contempt for your name? Meaning? These people are saying, yeah, we we follow Jesus and they have or we follow God and they have no clue. They’re not even pursuing God with their life. It’s this liturgical structure they’ve established, but their hearts have never connected to it. By offering defiled food on my altar. God says you’ve shown contempt, but you ask, how have we defiled you? By saying that the Lord’s table is contemptible.
When you offer blind animals for sacrifices, that not wrong? When you sacrifice lame, lame, or diseased animals, I’m coveting right now. Lame or diseased animals? Is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor. Would he be blessed with you? Would he accept you? Says the Lord of hosts? And Jesus is saying, when you come to other people, you give your best. When you come to the Lord, you’re just halfway doing it. I’ve called you to give me all of your heart. Not just some of it. I’m not just a thought on the shelf, but I’ve called you to give all of yourself to me. God’s response in this passage is this I want all of you or none of you, and there’s no in between. Is reiterating the thought of covenantal love. As God has demonstrated this love and covenant to us, and giving himself and all that he has to us, he’s asked the same in return out of a heart that’s willing. You know, the same place that we express covenantal love here on earth that God’s given us. The opportunity to demonstrate is is through the idea of marriage. You think about this for just a moment. If you went to the altar with with your wife or wherever you want to call, you got married underneath the awning or whatever you want to call it, if you went there and you said, honey, I’m here today to give you 90% of me.
How’s that going to go? Right. I love you with 95.43%. You know what she’s going to say? Okay. Come on. I am not standing here in this dress, looking this way to you. Give me 90%. I want all of you. How would she want all of you? It’s because in that relationship of Covenantally giving yourself to her, that love thrives when all of you is offered. And God is saying in this passage in like manner. I don’t want 95% of you. I created you that I may enjoy all of you. All of who you are belongs to who I am. And it should come to me. Makes sense in the marriage relationship. Bible tells us in Genesis, man and woman were created for one another. God puts the desires within our heart to pursue that mate, that we may enjoy life together and give all that we are to them, that our our relationship should thrive. In Genesis, it says that the goal of the marriage. For this reason, the husband or a husband shall leave his mother and the father, and the two shall be joined and become one flesh. God’s desire for marriage is oneness. It literally means the thought of oneness means at the the deepest seat of the identity of of the individual. It’s called it’s it’s the word of God in Hebrew. It’s the plurality of one and the plurality of marriage.
This oneness in the deepest seed is united together. It happens in covenantal love. And like ways God is saying you as man designed for woman in marriage, you as a being were designed for that relationship with God. Life doesn’t seem full, life doesn’t seem whole, life isn’t complete, and eternity won’t matter for you until in the deepest seed of your heart, in the covenantal love towards God, you give all that you are to him. Jesus says that he came, that his joy might be in you, and your joy might be made full. God came for you to experience him and all the goodness and glory that he has to offer. And on the backdrop of this thought in the book of Malachi, God then gives two ideas for us. For those who who ask this morning, who say, okay, I see, I see God loves and I see God has given his covenantal love to us. It’s it’s never changing. And now God is asking that we give all of ourselves to him. How? How do I know that I’ve done that in my relationship towards God? In chapter one and verse 13. I don’t have it on the screen, but in the same chapter Israel responds to God when God asks for this covenantal love in response. And they said, God, we’re just tired of you. My thought to that would be this. The reason that Israel expresses this tiredness to God is, is that they’re looking at God as this religious experience where there’s things that they desire or God desires for them to do.
And so any time God calls, it’s just because he has something that he wants. Into. The quickest way to rob yourself from your relationship with God is is religion. You think about people in your life who come to you, and the only time they ever come to you is because they want something from you. And so, so what you do is just avoid them. It’s not about what you’re doing, but really about you. That God is after. God desires your heart, and he desires for you to draw near to him, that he, by his power transforms your life, that you in your life begin to express the glory of God. It’s not about things, but about him. Another thought for Israel. The reason they’re tired is this they simply just don’t want to change. They like where their heart is focused. And they like the joy that sin brings. Rather than allow God to bring their joy, they turn it over to other things that eventually lead to emptiness. God in the book of Malachi, then begins to give a couple descriptions to the nation of Israel and says, hey, if you want to know if you really want to know, and you’re confused and you think that you’re a follower of me when I’m telling you you’re not here, here are a couple indicators for you that reveal really what your heart is about.
A religious person would would look at these things that God expresses and say this, okay, I messed up. I’ll, I’ll do better. But a person that’s focused on relationship with the Lord will say this God. I’m going to give more of you or more of me to you. God, I want to give you all that I am. God, I want to give you my heart that you can do a work in me. Rather than a religion to achieve. It’s about a relationship to enjoy because God has always loved you. And so God gives these two illustrations in the book of Malachi that relate to us how we know our heart is expressing joy in the Lord. And the first is this it? It comes by way of marriage. I will skip that. Says in chapter two and verse 11, Judah has been unfaithful. A detestable thing has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem. Judah has desecrated the sanctuary the Lord loves by marrying women who worship a foreign god. As for the man who does this, whoever he may be, may the Lord remove him from the tents of Jacob, even though he may bring an offering to the Lord Almighty. Another thing you do you flood the Lord’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because he no longer looks with favor on your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands.
You ask why? It is because the Lord is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner and the wife of your marriage covenant. God says this. If you want to know whether or not your heart is with me. Look at the way you treat your spouse. In this passage of Scripture. The nation of Israel was doing this. I’ve heard people say it this way. They’re trading in their wife in her 40s for two 20s. Right. Or they’re getting rid of their wife because they’re looking at at at just lust and greed. And so the nation of Israel has these, these ladies that they’ve conquered from other nations, and they’re bringing these women in, and they’re getting rid of their wives to marry these women that have been conquered. And God is saying, you have no idea how sacred your relationship is with me. When when God when God created man and woman. The first institution that God designed was marriage. And got in that marriage talks about the two becoming one. It is it is a worship ceremony. It says in this verse, it’s because the Lord is the witness between you and the wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant. What God is saying is that marriage relationship between man and woman is so sacred to God that when it takes place, the Lord is present.
It’s worship to him. God is treating the marriage relationship as a worship ceremony. And he’s saying to those that are married this morning, the way you treat your spouse is an act of worship before the Lord. Let me think about that. The way you respond in that relationship. Now, I can say this very easily. You’re not accountable for the way your spouse responds to you, but you are accountable for the way you choose to react to your spouse. God looks at this covenant and says, if you want to know areas of your life that should just display my goodness and glory. The first he gives is that relationship. God talks about two ways in these passages that dominate most of our lives. And so he says between the husband and wife, consider your marriage and act of worship before me. Covenantal love. Is the greatest love. In that covenant of giving yourself completely away to another, God gives the opportunity for you to allow truth and love and mercy and grace and freedom just to thrive in that relationship. It’s when the boundaries of that covenantal love are broken that that relationship suffers. God creates those boundaries in love, that there is security in that relationship, that it might find oneness in. Everything we do in that relationship before the Lord should look at as worship before our King. Meaning this when you get married. The willingness of your heart should be about giving all that you are to love someone else, despite their shortcomings.
Jesus when he says he loves you. And that covenantal relationship says, I am loving you, and while you are yet a sinner. Why? Because that love is what transforms. Had Jesus not shown that gracious love to me, I would be lost without it. All of us needed. I come to give 100% of who I am to display the beauty of who Jesus is. I see my purpose to my spouse to say to you, wife, I’m coming to give all that I am to honor Christ in our relationship, that you can see the glory of who Christ is being made known through me. And in that love. It transforms her. It’s an act of worship. That expresses the goodness of God. The marriage covenant exists so that unconditional love can flow. I love this passage in Nehemiah. It follows suit with Malachi and what’s taking place. They say this about the guys. Moreover, in those days I saw the men of Judah who had married women from Ashdod. This is in Nehemiah 13. They had married women from Ashdod, Ammon and Moab. Half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod, or the language of one of the other peoples, and did not know how to speak the language of Judah, which is the Hebrew language of the Bible. And he says in verse 25, I rebuke them and called curses down on them, and beat some of the men and pulled out their hair.
We’re going to do that, and we’re not going to do that. This is extreme. Nehemiah is writing this, expressing just how significant that relationship is, so much so that he has a hair pulling contest. It looks like a ladies fight going on. I don’t know what it is, but. That’s. It’s important. The covenant. The family. It’s the pillar of society. It’s the first institution that God has established. And your dedication to that, that covenant and your responsibility in difficulty to still love is the greatest expression of Jesus. You think about the people in your life that he’s talking in this passage. Are the people that you walk closely with in life, the people that you spend the most time with. And he says in verse 15, he goes on and says, has this has not the one God made you? You belong to him in body and spirit. All of you goes to him. And and what does the one God seek? Godly offspring. So be on your guard and do not be unfaithful to the wife of your youth. And so he’s saying in this passage, do you know what my goal is in this marriage is to create some kids. And do you know what my goal is for your children? I want to raise up a godly offspring for them so that as you have reflected Christ in your relationship for the next generation of children, I desire for them to come to know me in that relationship and for the next generation.
Those children might also express the goodness of who I am in this world. Display me and the covenantal relationship that I’ve called you to. God says this in the book of Jude in chapter two and verse eight, Joshua, son of nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110, and they buried him in the land of his inheritance at Timnath Harris, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. You can check my pronunciation that later, after that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Meaning all it takes for one generation to be lost is for the past generation to not display the goodness of God in their life. And God’s goal for the marriage is to establish itself in covenantal relationship before God, that they may be one at the deepest seed of who they are body, soul, spirit, and strength, reflecting the glory of God, so that future generations through that relationship may see the goodness of God and proclaim it as well. Children need to know the Lord. And most importantly, they need to know it in the home. Listen, God’s not going to hold the church responsible for your kids. He will to a degree.
But God primarily is holding you responsible for the upbringing of your children before him. That they know how much they are loved by him and may come to him and embracing what Jesus has done for them on the cross, and be able to enjoy him all the days of their lives. We need a generation of of children to raise up in the midst of this world who are less concerned about how much they’re making and more concerned about the integrity that they are displaying. When he kids in this world, in a generation that’s raising today, that are less concerned with being safe and more concerned with taking risks for Christ, even if it costs them. Now you think about this as parents when your kids leave the house, right? Especially when they get their driver’s license, first thing you say, be safe. Right? And I say, be safe. You think about the way that that plays out. Be be careful. You know what God’s will is constantly for us is just to be careful. What if. What if we changed this way? Be bold. When you go out today, take a stand. When you think about the way that you pray for your kids when they go out the door, you could say to them, be be faithful or or we get down on our knees. Once they get that driver’s license at their 16, they say, God, just keep them safe, right? Or I don’t know what.
I hope they just go to the grocery store, but oh you’re right. What if the prayer was more like this? God. Just help them to know you. God, I can’t be there for everything that they’re going to go through in life. But I know that you are, because you’re covenantal. Love says so and so. Rather than take time just to pray for every need of their life that I can’t even think of God, let’s just answer this one prayer. Let them know you and let them know you, just personally and intimately. God. Let them walk with you. If they know him. The promise is that his joy may be in them, and their joy may be made full, so that regardless of what they go through in this world, they rest with Christ. Second thought is this he talks about the marriage and the family relationship, but he he goes on the passage of Scripture, and he also talks about the willingness of your heart to give. He says in verse eight, Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me. But you ask, how are we robbing you? In tithes and offerings it says in verse nine, you are under a curse, your whole nation, because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this, says the Lord Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven, and pour out so much blessing that there will not be enough room, uh, room enough to store it.
This is the only time in the Bible God really says test him. It happens in the idea of giving. I’m going to tell you this. We can really take the last portion of this text and just run with it if we wanted to today, and make it just work for us. I give to God and God gives to me, right? God? I’ll give you 10%. And you put that Rolls-Royce in my house. That’s not what this verse is saying at all. What I, what I think is saying is this, um, the way that you know, that God’s got your heart is that you’re willing to give all that you are to him, and that includes every area of your life, even financially. Um, when when you’re willing to give to the Lord. In that way, it’s evidence that the Lord really has a grip of your heart. And when you start to give to God in this way, your heart really longs for the things that God longs for. When it costs you something, when following God costs you something, you start opening your ears and eyes to the things that God really is concerned about. And when you start opening your ears and eyes to the things that God’s concerned about, God starts speaking to your heart in that way. And when God starts speaking to your heart, he fills your cup.
You find joy and satisfaction in him. Because your life belongs to him. And I think God’s saying in this passage, if you if you don’t believe that I can bring joy to your life, just test me in this. I mean, I’ve promised it throughout Scripture. If you if you don’t think that I can fill your life even when things are falling apart, if you don’t feel that way, just try giving all that you have to me. Try giving all that you are to me. In this area. He’s talking about giving because it’s a tangible way that we can resolve whether or not our hearts are belonging to God. And he asked the nation of Israel to give to fill the storehouses. This happened in this particular book that the people of Israel stopped giving. The storehouses that filled the temple were supposed to be used for the priests and for offerings, and the priests would eat from that and provide for their family. But because they weren’t giving to to the temple, the priests then had to leave the temple and go back home and plow in their fields. And so God’s Word wasn’t getting proclaimed the way that God had desired for it to happen. And so he’s saying, this is affecting your nation. You don’t even see how you’re turning your back on me. You guys are becoming ignorant to the word because you’re not even supplying yourself so that God’s Word can be proclaimed.
And so we need to give that God’s word may be made known. The word tithe in the Old Testament, I should say to us, means the word of a 10th in the English language. So it’s talking about 10% in this passage. I would add to that that the word tithe isn’t something that we use in language of the New Testament. We talk about giving in the New Testament it means offering or sacrifice. The word tithe is an Old Testament law word. And so when God in this passage is saying 10%, just just to throw this out, that when the nation of Israel were giving, giving to the Lord, if you studied all of the giving that the nation of Israel was was to give to the Lord, 10% was their base giving. The nation of Israel had so many more sacrifices on top of that that most people estimate that the nation, when following God, was giving between 22 to 23% of their income to give to the Lord. I would look at that and say, wow, standards are way high, right? But then you look into the old or the New Testament. And the way of giving in the New Testament is one of sacrificial giving. Meaning 10% isn’t even a language for us. It’s just how much can we sacrifice to just let God’s name be made known? How much of your heart does God have, and how much do you keep for yourself? And God says in this passage, you are robbing me.
And they say in response, God, how are we robbing you or giving to you? Right? So how can that be considered robbing when we’re doing something? And God’s response is this. It’s because it’s all. It all belongs to me, guys. The stuff that you have. Isn’t really your stuff. My stuff. I made this world. It belongs to me. You don’t own anything and I can take it all away at any moment. What you are is a steward of the things I’ve created. You’re not responsible for 10% of it. You’re responsible for all of it. What you do with what you’ve been given. You’re accountable to me. And it’s the evidence of your heart. And I say this with. Joy this morning. Because here’s my heart’s desire. Um, I don’t I don’t care about our offering this morning. I’m not even looking at our finances. I’m just saying this. To say what Jesus is saying is evidence of your heart. And just leaving it at that, I don’t care. It’s between you and the Lord. And we can walk out of here and no one even knows, right? For Second Corinthians. Chapter nine is a chapter in the Bible on giving, and God expresses a thought in there where he says this I desire a joyful giver. And that would be my goal this morning. I don’t want to guilt anybody into anything.
This isn’t a religious list this morning. Our marriage. We didn’t talk about marriage to make you feel bad. We talked about marriage to say, you know, I understand what God’s called, and I want to go home. And I just want to do that in honor of Jesus. And I’m looking at giving and I understand what God has called. And I just want to do that. And in honor of Jesus. He’s given everything to me in covenant, and I want to give all that I am back to him, and I just want to love him for what he’s created me to love him to do. God desires a cheerful giver, and the way that you get to that place in your life is that you long for Jesus so much, and you long to give to Jesus, and you long to see the name of Jesus proclaimed. I enjoy. Just give and return. It’s not about God fighting you to take it away. God’s not even going to do that. It’s about you just opening your hands and just letting it go, whatever it is. It doesn’t even have to be money. You think about the beauty of what that means for us as a church here? In a few weeks, we’re going to start a campaign after Easter. We’ve got to finish up the outside of our facility. We actually have a timetable from the city of Lehi to do that.
And it’s going to take some money to do that. And it’s going to be an opportunity for us to think about this place and this city and the people who need to be here hearing about the Lord, and to say this, God, for what you’ve done in my life, I’m just thinking about people in these seats that just need to be here. I’m just going to give that. We can just see them come to know you and enjoy you and celebrate you. It baffles me. On Sunday morning when we get here and new people show up because we don’t have a sign on our building and it’s ugly out there. It is, man. But people are coming and you think once, once we turn the outside of this as a place that says to people, we love Jesus, and we’re just giving to this cause, and we want to see his name proclaimed, and he’s worth it, and we’re loving him. And God’s doing something here. When the outside starts saying that, could you imagine what’s going to happen? We’ll be looking for a new building by the end of the year, right? It’s all just to say this. Does Jesus have your heart? God’s gone silent before the nation of Israel to ask that question. As I have loved you. I mean, do you look at the sacrifice that I have made on your behalf? I mean, what more can I do than just to simply say I love you? And I have created you for me, that you may enjoy me all the days of your life from now into eternity.
I have loved you with this covenantal love that just will not fade. It will not stop, it will not relent, but it is just giving itself away regardless of the way that you’ve spit on it and harmed it and abused it. It is here just crying out that you may respond in love and return. Like I just thought is just come. Come to the Lord. Matter of fact, the book ends talking about the coming of the Lord. This made me think of a song. In closing, I’ll just say this. Um. There’s a I call this my favorite song. You guys know it, right? It says, um, Jesus loves me. This, I know for the Bible tells me so. One of the things I love about just that song, it gives a simplistic way for us to look at the evidence of Jesus’s love to us. I mean, what if you flipped it for your own personal life? What if you said, I love Jesus? This I know. For my. Will you say? Where’s the evidence of it? And someone looks into your life. I see Jesus. Malaga points to these couple of things for us, that we may see the evidence of God’s love within us and know that we’re not fooling ourselves. But yes, indeed, we love God with our heart. Because that’s what he’s after.