Malachi: Return To Me - Week 6 (Malachi 3:6-18)
Malachi 3:6-18
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Malachi 3:6-18
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Malachi 3:6-18 〰️ Malachi 3:6-18 〰️
This week’s passage kicks off with God reminding His people (and us) that He is forever unchanging. “Because I, the Lord, have not changed, you...have not been destroyed.” (v6). God promised that Israel would be a great nation (Gen. 12:2) and the Messiah would come from them (Isaiah 7:14), so despite their unfaithfulness and rebellion, He remained faithful to His promises. Up to this point in Malachi, God has been laying out a case for them to see how they have rejected God. Despite His steadfast faithfulness toward them, He tells them that they deserve destruction for their sins, but it’s His prior promises to them that keep them from being wiped out completely. But this does not mean they are without judgment or punishment. Countless times, they have rejected God’s ways, been taken into exile, and cried out to Him. We covered this more in-depth in our study through the book of Judges here— this chart is particularly helpful for me to see the recurring pattern of Israel’s rebellion, oppression, repentance, freedom, and rest (on repeat).
God follows this up by calling His people to return to Him in whole-hearted, repentant worship. For so long, they have given God half-hearted sacrifices, withheld offerings, or disgraced the sacredness of the temple, God’s dwelling place. But despite this, God offers them another opportunity to return to Him. It’s easy to forget, but the cost of sin before God is death and eternal separation from Him (Rom. 6:23). The opportunity to bring offerings before God to pay this debt was a blessing in and of itself, and Israel repaid this kindness with unfaithfulness and disrespect. But we serve a God who is kind and patient with us (Ps. 145:8), continually granting opportunity to come to Him. Even for us today, until our very last breath, we have the chance to turn to God in repentance.
And yet again, God gives Israel another chance: “Return to me, and I will return to you.” (v7). We’re then presented with another hypothetical question meant for God to give an example of how they have failed and how they can respond obediently— by returning to faithfully giving their resources to God so that the temple, the priests, and those in poverty can be cared for. God’s heart is for justice, both for the glory He is due, but also to care for the weak. He tells Israel to return to Him through faithful giving so that they may “Test me in this way” (v10). In this passage, we also need to define our terms regarding the word “test” found in v10. We read Deuteronomy 6:16 and can pretty clearly see that testing God is strictly forbidden. In this case, in Deuteronomy, it’s an act of rebellion; a lack of faith. Deuteronomy continues in v17-18, “Carefully observe the commands of the Lord your God, the decrees and statutes he has commanded you. Do what is right and good in the Lord’s sight, so that you may prosper...”
In Malachi, however, God tells His people to “test” Him by trusting Him in faith with what is already His. Testing God out of faithlessness or disobedience (“God, I don’t think you can or will...”) versus testing God out of faith and trust (“God, I am trusting that You will provide because I know you can...”) are very different perspectives when approaching the Lord. I feel like we say this nearly every week (and certainly every series we’re in), but God looks at the heart of His people, not just the outward actions (1 Samuel 16:7; Jeremiah 17:10; Matthew 5:27-28). So when we come up against the concept of “testing” God, it’s about whether it’s found in faith or mistrust.
The Lord continues in His indictment of Israel, revealing His clear sight of hearts and motives toward obedience: “Your words against me are harsh...You have said, ‘It is useless to serve God. What have we gained by keeping his requirements and walking mournfully before the Lord of Armies?’” (v13-14).
“‘What did we gain?’ presents a revealing insight into their mentality. The dominant motive in their lives was personal, material advantage. This drove a wedge between them and God, when they should rather have been praying, ‘Turn my heart towards your statutes and not towards selfish gain.’”¹ God’s people forgot the joy and honor of living in communion with Him. They looked at the world around them, adopted pagan worldviews (primarily through marriage, as we saw in 2:10-16), and began to see their relationship with God as transactional. “We obey the Lord, so He will meet our needs,” rather than “We obey the Lord because He is a good God.” Again, obedience and sacrifice to God are ends in and of themselves. Being restored before God was and is a privilege, but Israel began to feel it was one-sided, asking in their hearts, “What have we gained by keeping [God’s] requirements?” (v14).
As we read this passage, there is likely a felt gap between God's condemnation of Israel’s disobedience and what it means on the other side of the cross. Jesus Christ paid the debt we owed before God, and those of us who are in Him have right-standing before Him. But for many (if not all) of us still, the question “What have we gained by keeping God’s requirements?” might not feel that far from fiction. We can so easily look at our relationship with the Father as transactional, questioning why we should trust God with our resources and lives, whether it be time, finances, or giftings. Sacrifice to the Lord looks different to many people, but there is undoubtedly a call for those in Him to give God their best. If we truly believe that Jesus is the Son of God who died, rose again, and conquered death on our behalf, why are we so hesitant to give God every part of our hearts and lives?
Discussion Questions
Could someone read Malachi 3:6-18 for us?
What stood out to you from the passage?
Does this passage remind you of another part of Scripture?
Do you have any questions?
Read v8-9. How was Israel “robbing” God?
What does God mean when He said to “test” him in v10?
How do you find yourself most often “robbing” God?
Read Deuteronomy 6:16. What’s a distinction we should make between these two passages in “testing” God? (Said another way: In what ways is it sinful or not sinful to test God?)
1. John L. Mackay, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi: God’s Restored People, Focus on the Bible Commentary (Ross-shire, Scotland: Christian Focus Publications, 2003), 335.