TEXT:
Malachi 3:13-18
On
this last Sunday of the Church Year, we hear from the last book of
the Old Testament, written by the prophet Malachi. It’s about 400
years before the birth of Jesus. The 70-year exile in Babylon was
behind the people of Israel. God brought a remnant back to Judea.
The walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt. The temple was rebuilt with
worship and sacrifices restored.
But
all was not well. Instead of offering proper sacrifices and
offerings, the people did not bring their best. They withheld their
tithes. They offered blind, lame, and sick sheep as opposed to
unblemished ones. They offered animals that had been stolen from
their neighbor. And the priests went right along with this. They
accepted these sinful sacrifices and abdicated their duty to uphold
God’s holiness. They did not rebuke the people and lead them to
repentance. Moreover, the prophet also makes it clear that marriage
was not being kept sacred. Contrary to God’s Word, people were
marrying those who worshiped idols. Even proper marriages between
Israelites were not healthy. People were not being faithful to their
marriage vows. Divorce was rampant.
The
Lord gave Malachi some hard words to speak to the people, and rightly
so, as you can well understand. Yet our text today says that the
people had some hard words for the Lord. “Your words have been
hard against me,” says the Lord.
What
“hard words” did the people have? Earlier in the book, they
challenge God’s love for his people (1:2). A bit later, they claim
that God favors those who do evil and therefore question if God is
really a God of justice (2:17). And in our text today, they say that
“It is vain to serve God.” Why bother having faith in God? Why
bother obeying his Word? Why bother repenting of our so-called sins?
Where has it gotten us? Those who do evil get away with it. Not
only that, they even prosper!
Next,
Malachi turns his attention to a remant within the remnant in Judea.
He turns his attention to those who feared the Lord. Malachi says
“they spoke with one another.” What did they say to each other?
Perhaps they reminded themselves of their need to return to the Lord,
to repent of their sins, to rely on the Lord’s mercy. The prophet
says that the Lord paid attention and heard them. Their names are
written in his book of remembrance … as if God needs a book to
remind himself of those whose are his.
Think
of it this way: you and I might like to keep a record of those things
that are precious to us, important things we want to remember, items
that are meaningful and irreplaceable. We write them down in a memo
book. For those of us who are electronically inclined, we might use
an “app.” But here’s the difference between our method’s and
God’s. In God’s book, no records will ever be erased or deleted.
God’s hard drive will never crash.
This
is his Word towards those who fear the Lord: “They shall be mine …
in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare
them as a man spares his son who serves him. Then once more you shall
see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one
who serves God and one who does not serve him.” The distinction
between the righteous and the wicked is not about whether they are
sinners or not. Neither are they without sin. Rather, the righteous
are those who serve God because they have faith. The wicked are
those who do not serve God because they do not have faith. And the
Lord promises that a day of judgment is still to come when God’s
justice over all injustice will finally be made public and visible to
all.
For
you and me today, we might be tempted to have similar “hard words”
against the Lord. Is it vain to serve God? In these gray and latter
days, it sure seems that way sometimes. It all seems so pointless.
Better to eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die. Serving the
Lord may bring opposition … from friends, from family, from
government.
In
these gray and latter days, it often seems as though the wicked
prosper and the righteous suffer. Perhaps we, like the Israelites,
also figure “What’s the point?” and we give up on being
faithful to the Lord’s Word. And so, we do not give him our best.
We withhold our offerings. We fail in our marriage vows. We let the
world around us mold us and shape us rather than the Holy Spirit
working in us. And like the faithless priests in Malachi’s day,
pastors today fail to turn their congregations from their sin and
call them to repentance. At times, Christians today don’t look any
different from the unbelieving world around them. There is no
apparent distinction between those who serve God and those who do
not.
So
often, it does appear that believers suffer and unbelievers prosper.
Kind of like Jesus in our Gospel reading. There you see the Christ
of God, his chosen One, carrying his cross on the way to his own
execution. There you see the King of Kings at the place of the
Skull, crucified between two criminals. The one who served God
perfectly his entire life, flawless in every way, totally without
sin, appears to be wicked … one who does not serve God. This is
the way in which the sins of the world were laid upon Jesus. God’s
judgment over your sin was “hard against” his own Son so that you
could have freedom, release from your debt to God, forgiveness, and
life everlasting. Through Christ’s saving death, he reconciled all
things in heaven and on earth, “making peace by the blood of his
cross” (Col 1:20).
Another
name for this Last Sunday in the Church Year is “Christ the King
Sunday.” At the end of the Church Year, we think about the end of
time, the return of the Lord, the culmination of all history. The
theme of this day is repentance, hopeful joy, and confident
anticipation, and this carries over into Advent next week and the
weeks ahead. With our eyes on the Last Day, our eyes are on the
Crucified One … our King. The inscription of above his head
declares him King. Jesus is enthroned on his cross.
The
righteous King speaks words of forgiveness from his throne. Even
while hanging on the cross, he speaks words of love, words of
forgiveness to the ones who were crucifying him. That includes you
and me. Our sins grasped those hammers and drove those nails into
his hands and feet. And still, he forgives.
The
wicked criminal acknowledges his crime. He says to the other
criminal, “We are receiving the due reward of our deeds.” He
acknowledges that Jesus has a kingdom: “Jesus, remember me when you
come into your kingdom.” And the King says, “Today, you will be
with me in Paradise.” Trusting in Christ, the wicked one becomes
righteous. He who is repentant has his name written in the Book of
Life … and it will never be erased or deleted.
The
Word of the Lord through the prophet Malachi is for you who are
marked with the name of Christ in Holy Baptism and who trust in
Christ for your salvation. Your name is written in his book of
remembrance. You are his. You are his treasured possession. He
spares you as a man spares his own son who serves him. Yet God did
not spare his own Son. St. Paul said in Romans 8, “He who did not
spare his own Son but gave him for us all, how will he not also with
him graciously give us all things?” (Rom. 8:32). “He has
delivered [you] from the domain of darkness and transferred [you] to
the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom [you] have redemption, the
forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:13).
In
these Last Days, the Lord will strengthen our resolve to live as his
people, to live in repentance and faith, to serve him, to love our
neighbor, to be a light in this dark and dying world until he returns
and says to you, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”
INI
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