Monday Evening, March 4, 1974 — Richmond, Virginia
Ministry through Brother Stephen Kahn
Grace, love, and peace be with you all.
Lord, we love Thee because Thou hast first loved us. We pray that even now Thy love will once again constrain us, that we may truly run after Thee.
O Lord, we do desire to declare with the song, “Whom have I in heaven but Thee? And whom do I desire on earth except Thyself?” O Lord, fill us once again with Thy love, that we may be able to hear Thy voice.
We pray that our whole being may be quickened by Thy Spirit, that our whole being may cooperate with Thee. We commit this time into Thy hands and ask Thee to bless it unto Thy praise and Thy glory. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Will you please turn to Malachi, chapter 2, the last book of the Old Testament? Malachi, chapter 2. We will read from verse 11.
Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord which He loveth, and hath married the daughter of a foreign god.
The Lord will cut off, to the man that doeth this, him that waketh and him that answereth, out of the tents of Jacob, and him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts.
And this again ye do: ye cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, and with sighing, insomuch that He regardeth not the offering any more, neither receiveth it with good will at your hand.
Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the Lord hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously, though she is thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.
And did He not make one, although He had the residue of the Spirit? And wherefore one? He sought a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.
For I hate putting away, saith the Lord, the God of Israel; and him that covereth his garment with violence, saith the Lord of hosts: therefore take heed to your spirit, that ye deal not treacherously.
Ye have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied Him? In that ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He delighteth in them; or where is the God of justice?
Behold, I send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way before Me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in, behold, He cometh, saith the Lord of hosts.
But who may abide the day of His coming? And who shall stand when He appeareth? For He is like a refiner’s fire, and like fullers’ soap:
And He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and He will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer unto the Lord offerings in righteousness.
Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in ancient years.
And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the sojourner from his right, and fear not Me, saith the Lord of hosts.
For I, the Lord, change not; therefore ye, O sons of Jacob, are not consumed.
From the days of your fathers ye have turned aside from Mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto Me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. But ye say, Wherein shall we return?
We mentioned this morning that the burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi was just one word, and that word was repent.
God was calling His people—a people called by His name, a people who were supposed to be fully committed to Him, a people who were to be the vessel of His testimony on this earth. Yet the burden of the Lord to this people was, “Repent.”
God’s people need to repent. Not only do the people of this world need to repent, but God’s people need to repent. The closer you are to God, the more you need to repent.
So, brothers and sisters, do not think that we are beyond repentance. If we see the Lord, if we hear Him, there is much in us that we need to abhor and repent of in dust and ashes.
Oftentimes we do not feel the need to repent because we do not see Him and we do not hear Him. The more you see the Lord, just like the prophet Isaiah, the more you will repent.
Isaiah was a prophet, and how he prophesied! How strong were his prophecies! Yet when he entered into the temple of the Lord in the year that King Uzziah died, he saw the Lord. And how he repented before the Lord. He acknowledged that he was a man of unclean lips, dwelling among a people of unclean lips.
And thank God, there is forgiveness; there is grace. So, brothers and sisters, the last message of the Old Testament was the message of repentance, just as the first message in the New Testament was the message of repentance.
John the Baptist was sent before our Lord to preach repentance: “Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
Now, dear brothers and sisters, we are living toward the close of this dispensation, and I do believe that the word of the Lord to His church is also, “Repent.”
In Revelation 2 and Revelation 3, you find the Lord’s word to the seven churches. You may count the word repent eight times in those seven letters. To five of the seven churches, the word of the Lord was, “Repent.”
So, dear brothers and sisters, may we really humble ourselves before the Lord. May we see the need of repentance, that we may be fully recovered and restored to what the Lord wants us to be.
We mentioned that the first issue of the Lord with the Jewish remnant at that time was the issue of love. The Lord said, “I have loved you.”
“I have loved you since the day that I chose Jacob. I loved Jacob and hated Esau. I loved you all the time. Look at the history of Jacob.”
O, God loved Jacob, in spite of what a person Jacob was, until God was able to transform him from Jacob to Israel. Now, that was love.
Look at the history of the children of Israel: how they were slaves in Egypt, and God sent Moses to deliver them out of the fiery furnace. Look at their history in the wilderness—how God was true, how they proved God ten times, how God protected them, and how God provided for them. Yet their hearts were hard.
Even so, under Joshua, with a new generation, God led the children of Israel into the promised land. Then you look into the book of Judges, and what do you find there?
But God prepared a king—David. Through David, the kingdom was established before God. Yet you read 1 Kings, 2 Kings, 1 Chronicles, and 2 Chronicles, and what a history you find.
Because of their unfaithfulness to God, they were taken captive into Babylon. But still, after seventy years of captivity, God allowed them to come back. Only a remnant came back.
Even in the history of the remnant over a hundred years, how they fluctuated! How there were ups and downs! At the time of Malachi, you find this remnant even questioning the love of God.
God said, “I have loved you,” and they said, “Wherein hast Thou loved us?” When a person begins to ask such a question, it is evident that he has no love for God. If we do not appreciate His love, how can we love?
So the first issue between God and this remnant was the issue of love. Brothers and sisters, certainly this is something that we need to bring before the Lord all the time: Have we left our first love?
Things may go on as usual, and yet if we have left our first love, God says, “I have this against thee.”
How are we going to restore our first love? You cannot restore it by yourself. Love comes from God. The only way to have our love restored is to see the love of God. Let the love of Christ constrain us, that we may love Him.
Then this morning we entered into the second issue between God and the remnant. It was an issue concerning honour.
A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I am a father, where is Mine honour? And if I am a master, where is My fear?
God said, “How do ye despise My name?” Yet they retorted, “Wherein have we despised Thy name?” They offered polluted bread upon the altar.
Brothers and sisters, if God cannot deal with us on the level of love, then the lower level of dealing will be on the level of honour—of duty.
Do we do our duty? Do we really honour Him? Do we respect His name? And by respecting His name, He simply means: Do we do His will, or do we just give Him lip service?
The children of Israel at that time still offered sacrifice, but they offered the lame, the blind, and imperfect sacrifices. They said that the table of the Lord was contemptible. As long as you do something for the Lord, it should be enough for Him.
But we know that all these sacrifices were types of Christ. God could not accept anything other than Christ and His perfection.
So, brothers and sisters, do we serve the Lord from our heart, or do we just give the Lord lip service? Do we think that, as long as we are giving Him something, He should be satisfied?
How do we despise His name? Are we doing His will? That is to honour His name.
The Lord said that if Israel did not honour Him, one day all the nations would honour Him and present to Him a pure offering. Of course, that is a prophecy.
In other words, one day the grace of God would come to the nations. Out of every nation, every tribe, every tongue, and every people, God would gather unto Himself a people who would offer to God spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Christ Jesus.
Now tonight I would like to go a little further. We do not know how far we can go, but we will go as far as we can tonight.
There was a third controversy between God and Judah and the children of Israel at that time. It was this matter of unfaithfulness toward God. They profaned the sanctuary of the Lord, which He loved.
In the history of the children of Israel, when the remnant came back, they came back with a pure desire to rebuild the temple of God. They were a separated people. They were a holy people unto a holy God.
But not long afterward, you find that the remnant who had returned began to marry the daughters of the land and to give their sons to the daughters of the land. There was mixture very soon.
When Ezra came back, that was one of the problems with the remnant at that time. If you read the book of Ezra, when Ezra learned that the children of Israel who had come back had married the daughters of the land and had given their sons to them, how Ezra reacted against this abomination in the sight of God!
According to the law of God, this people was to be a separated people. God separated them from all the nations. God kept them as a pure seed because out of that nation should come forth the Messiah, the Christ.
Yet this people who came back soon became mixed. When Ezra heard about it, you remember, he rent his garments, plucked out the hair of his head and beard, and prostrated himself before the Lord. He fasted and wept before the Lord as he confessed.
While he was doing that, those who feared the Lord gathered together with him, and there was weeping before the Lord until the word came: “There is yet hope. Let us put away these foreign wives.”
There was yet hope, and the children of Israel were purified under Ezra.
But Ezra returned, and then, thirty years after Ezra, Nehemiah came back. Of course, the main burden of Nehemiah was the rebuilding of the wall.
During that time, the children of Israel seemed to be well established before God. Nehemiah was there for twelve years, then he went back to the Persian court for a certain time. But when he came back, you know what happened.
When he came back, he noticed that once again this people, who under Ezra had been purified of the abomination of marrying the daughters of the land, had committed the same abomination.
Within a short period—within a generation—could you believe that? Within a generation, this thing happened for the second time.
The Bible says they were unfaithful to God. They profaned the sanctuary of the Lord. Why? Because the Lord dwelt in their midst. The Lord is holy; therefore, they must be holy.
The opposite of holy is common. The opposite of holiness is mixture. They were separated from the world unto God, and they were to maintain their separation in order that they might be a holy vessel for God.
But they committed this abomination. As a matter of fact, what they did involved two things.
First, they divorced the wives of their youth.
In the beginning, when God created man, He created male and female. He created Adam, and out of Adam He formed Eve, so that the two might be one flesh. Why? Because God sought a godly seed.
During the time of Moses, Moses permitted them to divorce their wives by giving them a bill of divorcement. But when the Pharisees came to the Lord and said, “Can we divorce for any reason, just by giving a letter?” you remember what the Lord answered them in Matthew 19.
The Lord said, “In the beginning, God created man and woman, and the two shall be joined into one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.”
The reason Moses allowed them to divorce their wives was because of the hardness of their hearts. In other words, God allowed it, and yet God never approved it—never approved it.
The Lord said, “It was not so from the beginning.” There is only one reason given in Scripture for divorce, and that is fornication. Aside from that, it is God’s will that the man and woman whom He has united together should not be separated.
Here you find with the children of Israel that this was the first problem. They simply gave their wives a divorce letter, and that was it.
But that was not all. After their divorce, they married another—and worse, they married a strange woman, a woman of the land.
So the tears of the divorced wives filled the altar of God, and yet while they were doing that, they still went to offer oblation to God. No wonder God did not accept it. Yet they said, “Why dost Thou not accept our offering?”
Brothers and sisters, you remember that one day our Lord Jesus said to the Pharisees and the scribes, “Woe unto you, Pharisees and scribes, hypocrites.”
Why? Because they tithed mint, anise, and cummin, but they neglected the weightier matters of the law: judgment, mercy, and faith.
Here you find a people who, on the one hand, were doing abominations. They profaned the sanctuary of the Lord. They divorced their wives because of their lust and married strange women against the law of God.
They were doing all these abominable things, yet they turned around and offered oblation to God, expecting God to accept them. Hypocrisy!
They did the obvious things, but they forgot the weightier matters of the law. They entered into a kind of formalism. They kept the form of religion, but they violated its very spirit.
Brothers and sisters, what has that to do with us? Of course, the message to us today is spiritual.
You know the words of Paul. He was jealous with the jealousy of God for the believers at Corinth. Why? Because he had presented them and espoused them to Christ as a pure virgin to one husband, Christ.
He was fearful lest they should be corrupted from the simplicity and purity that is toward Christ.
Now, we have to change the metaphor a little bit, because here you find the husbands were unfaithful. But when you come to our relationship with the Lord, He is the Husband and we are the wife.
In other words, we who are the Lord’s are His bride, and how we need to be faithful unto Him. Yet how easily we are carried away from the simplicity that is in Christ. We get involved with the world.
You remember what James said:
Ye adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore would be a friend of the world maketh himself an enemy of God.
And the apostle John says:
Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
Brothers and sisters, what is this to us today? It is worldliness and unfaithfulness. What is our unfaithfulness toward our God, with whom we have a covenant relationship?
Our unfaithfulness toward God is this matter of turning to the world as if our Lord were not sufficient for us. We need to go into this world to try to find satisfaction.
Brothers and sisters, this is considered spiritual unfaithfulness.
Do not think that you are beyond that. It is true that at one time you left the world behind you to follow the Lord. Thank God for that. But there is no guarantee that you will not return to the world.
There is no guarantee. When your love toward the Lord begins to grow cold, then probably you will begin to cast longing eyes toward the world. That is considered before the Lord as unfaithfulness.
You may still continue outwardly. You may still be religious. You may still attend meetings. You may still do some little things. Yet the Lord says, “Where is the weightier thing? Where is that purity? Where is that faithfulness unto the Lord?”
Brothers and sisters, if we have returned to the world, become worldly, and begun to have a longing for the world, this is the point at which we should repent, because we are called to be a separated people unto God.
The fourth issue is found in Malachi 2:17:
Ye have wearied the Lord with your words. Yet ye say, Wherein have we wearied Him? In that ye say, Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He delighteth in them; or where is the God of justice?
They wearied the Lord with their words. Brothers and sisters, have you ever had such an experience? You are wearied by the words of someone. You are tired.
What did they say? Listen: “Every one that doeth evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He delighteth in them; or where is the God of judgment?”
Can you believe your ears? This people, who were supposed to be God’s people—what did they say? They said that he who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord. In other words, they were taking the position of unbelievers.
They said, “God delights in evil. Where is the God of judgment? He does not care.”
I wonder whether this was the beginning of what, later on in the time of Christ, you find as a sect in Judaism called Sadduceeism.
Who were the Sadducees in the time of Christ? They were a religious sect of Judaism, like the Pharisees. They were the agnostics of Judaism. In other words, they were the intellectuals.
They did not believe in anything supernatural, even though they professed to believe God. How can you believe in God and not believe in the supernatural?
Yet they thought they were the most rational people in the world. They reasoned out everything in the Scripture. Anything they could not reason out, they rejected. They could believe only what they could reason out.
They did not believe in angels because they did not see them. They did not believe in resurrection. They did not believe in anything supernatural, and yet they were a sect of Judaism.
I wonder whether this was the beginning of that spirit. They were supposed to be God’s people, and yet they reasoned: “Look around. He that doeth evil is good in the sight of God. God delights in evil. Why? Because God does not judge. If God hates evil, why does He not judge?”
They were so sarcastic toward God.
You may think this cannot happen with believers, but listen. In writing the first letter to the Corinthian believers, Paul had to deal with this very matter. These Corinthian believers did not believe in resurrection.
They were believers, and yet they did not believe in resurrection. Paul argued with them: “If you do not believe in resurrection, then Christ, who died, has not been raised. If that were the case, we would be the most miserable people in the world. Our whole hope is based on resurrection.”
They were proud of themselves as being very intellectual. Intellectualism! They lived in the realm of the mind; they did not live in the realm of the spirit.
Probably because their ways were so evil, it was their wishful thinking that there would be no resurrection.
Or some people may be so self-righteous. They say, “Where is the God of judgment? God should notice how righteous I am and how evil the other person is, and yet God does not judge. Therefore, God loves evil; He delights in evil.”
They are self-righteous. Is it possible? What a warning to us today.
Brothers and sisters, if our relationship with the Lord is only in the realm of the mind, in the realm of the intellect, we are in danger.
I do not say that God does not want us to be intelligent. If He did not want us to be intelligent, He would not give us a mind. He wants us to have the mind of Christ.
But certainly we are not to live just in the realm of the mind. We have to live in the spirit. God is Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth—that is, in reality.
Only when you are led by the Spirit of God are you sons of God. In spiritual things, you have to be ruled and governed by the Spirit.
When you live in the realm of your soul, in the realm of your intellect, you begin to try to figure out and reason out everything. Very soon, you will fall into Sadduceeism.
How many today in Christianity have fallen into this! They profess that they believe in God, and yet they cannot accept anything supernatural. They do not believe in resurrection. They do not even believe in the new birth.
If you take that position, what will be the result? The result will be, “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.” That is the consequence.
Dear brothers and sisters, how we need to live in the Spirit. How we need to be led by the Spirit of God. It is only in the Spirit that we can understand spiritual things. Then we will not fall into the snare of the Sadducees.
Here you find the beginning of that spirit. “Does God judge? What will God answer to that?” They questioned God and said, “You do not judge. Where is the God of judgment? You do not care at all.”
God’s answer to them was in Malachi 3:
Behold, I send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way before Me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in, behold, He cometh, saith the Lord of hosts.
But who may abide the day of His coming? And who shall stand when He appeareth?
The Lord said, “Behold, do not say, ‘Where is the God of judgment?’” Even though you may not see judgment today, why? Because there is mercy with God.
God said, “Behold, I am sending a messenger before Me. Then the Messenger of the covenant will suddenly come to His temple.”
Of course, brothers and sisters, we know this points to John the Baptist as the messenger whom God sent before Christ, and the Messenger of the covenant is Christ.
But, of course, with the Old Testament prophets, as we have mentioned a number of times, they did not know the difference between the first coming and the second coming of the Lord. To them, the coming of the Messiah was just one event.
They did not know that at the first coming of the Lord, He came in humiliation. He came as the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world. He came to give grace to man.
They did not know that at His second coming He would come in glory, as the Lion of the tribe of Judah, to judge the nations.
Why did they not know the two comings of the Lord? Because between those two comings is the age of the church. The church is a mystery, hidden for ages in God and revealed later by the Spirit through the apostles and prophets.
Therefore, when the Old Testament prophets prophesied, they prophesied the coming of the Lord as one event: the Lord would come and would judge.
Yet even so, before the coming of the Messenger of the covenant, God sent a messenger. What was the message of that messenger, four hundred years later, in the person of John the Baptist? “Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”
You are looking for the kingdom of God. You are saying, “Where is the God of judgment?” Do you really want God to come and judge you? Are you ready for it?
You think you are so righteous. You expect Him to come and judge the evil, not knowing that when He comes, He will first judge you.
That is why God first sends a messenger to prepare the way of the Lord. How gracious! How merciful!
Then the Messenger of the covenant shall suddenly come to His temple.
Brothers and sisters, in history, of course, we know this happened about two thousand years ago. The messenger arrived, but his message was rejected by the Jewish nation.
Those who accepted his message were baptized. The sinners and publicans were baptized. But the Pharisees, the scribes, and the rulers refused to accept the baptism of John.
Not only that, even when the Messenger of the covenant—our Lord Jesus—came to them, they crucified Him on the cross.
“Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him!”
The blood has been upon them for centuries. But one day, when Christ shall come back again, Elijah will first come to turn the hearts of the children to the fathers, and the hearts of the fathers to the children.
In other words, God is so patient and so merciful.
Brothers and sisters, sometimes, especially when your faith is weak, you begin to question God. You begin to question His ways. You begin to feel uneasy.
“Why is it that God does not judge? Look around and see all the evil, and yet God does not judge. Does He really delight in evil? And look at me.”
When your faith is weak, this is the time that you think you are better. You say, “Why does not God judge these people?”
Do you not know that when the Lord comes, He shall first judge the house of God? Judgment shall come to the house of God first, then to Israel, and then to the nations. Are you ready for it? Are you there?
Who shall endure the day of His coming? Are we looking for His coming?
Thank God for all the renewed interest in prophecy. Thank God that many people are interested in the coming of the Lord. Thank God for that.
But, brothers and sisters, to be interested is one thing; to be ready and prepared is another thing.
Who can endure that day of His coming? Do you know what it will mean to you? Who shall stand when He appears?
When you read 2 Corinthians 5, you find Paul mentioning two things. He says, “The love of Christ constraineth us.”
Knowing that One died for all, we must live for Him. The love of Christ constrains us so that we cannot live for ourselves; we have to live for Him. Thank God for that.
But immediately following that, he speaks of the terror of the Lord. These two things go together: the love of Christ and the terror of the Lord.
On the one hand, the love of Christ constrains you. On the other hand, the terror of the Lord urges you on.
When the Lord shall return, Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3, we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. A fire will appear to test our work.
If our work is gold, silver, and precious stones, it shall stand the testing, and we shall be rewarded. But if our work is wood, hay, and stubble, it will be consumed. We shall suffer loss.
We ourselves shall be saved, but so as through fire. Think of that. Are you looking for His return?
Suppose He comes suddenly tonight. Suppose suddenly we are taken up to appear at the judgment seat. What would happen?
O, to know that He is a refiner’s fire. He is fullers’ soap. In other words, our Lord Jesus is like a refiner’s fire. He is refining us. He is burning away all the dross, all the impurities of our lives.
He is like fullers’ soap. He is cleansing us and taking away the dirt from us.
He is like a refiner sitting there to refine silver. Somebody tells us that in the book In His Steps, when the author first went to India, he saw a man sitting on the ground beside a crucible with a fire beneath it, refining silver.
The man was refining the silver, burning it to take away the dross and impurities. The observer asked him, “How long will you do this? When do you think your work is done?”
The man said, “I will continue to refine it until my face is reflected in it. Then the work is done.”
Brothers and sisters, is this not what the Lord is doing with us today?
You may be thinking, “Why does God not judge the world? Why does not God judge evil?” You see evil all around, and somehow you feel that you are righteous. Yet God does not judge evil, and you say, “Where is the God of judgment?”
But do you know that God is like a refiner? He is sitting there very patiently beside you, and He is refining you day by day.
You wonder why the world has such an easy time and you have such a hard time. “Where is the God of judgment?” This is the God of judgment. He is preparing you for that day.
As the Bible says, if we judge ourselves today, then we shall not be judged. If we allow Him to purify us today, until His image is reflected in us, then, brothers and sisters, what a glorious day when He shall return and we shall see Him.
We will not be ashamed, and He will not be ashamed of us. How important that is.
He is working. He is working patiently in order to bring forth an offering in righteousness.
Yes, He is coming. When He shall come, He will begin to judge. He will begin to judge the house of God, then the nation of Israel, and then the nations.
At that time, it is too late to repent. You will regret, but it is too late to repent. This is the day in which we can repent before God.
Thank God, He is refining us. If there is something in our lives that needs to be repented of, do it today.
If it is under the blood, it will not appear at the judgment seat of Christ. But anything that is not under the blood, one day everything will appear, and judgment will be accomplished. It is a terrible day.
Knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade.
Unfortunately, they said, “Wherein shall we return?” The Lord said, “Return unto Me, and I will return unto you.” Yet they said, “Wherein shall we return?” There was no repentance.
Think of that: the children of God who do not repent.
The fifth issue: God said,
Will a man rob God? Yet ye rob Me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee?
One of the Ten Commandments is, “Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not rob.” Here you find these people, and God said, “Why do you rob Me?” Can man rob God? Yes, you can.
“How?” “In tithes and offerings.”
One of the things that Nehemiah observed when he came back, in Nehemiah 13, was that the children of Israel did not bring the tithe to the house of God.
Therefore, the Levites and the singers fled to their own fields. They had no means of support.
God commanded the children of Israel to bring tithes to the house of God and to bring heave offerings to God’s house. These tithes and offerings were to support the Levites who served God, and the Levites were to bring tithes to support the priests.
This was God’s way. But they forsook the house of God. The Levites fled to their fields because the tithes were not brought. They could not be supported, so they had to go to their fields to support themselves, and the house of God was forsaken.
Is it not strange? These people came back to build the house of God. These people came back to serve God in the house. Yet these very people who built the temple and were supposed to serve God in the temple neglected the house of God.
God said, “You rob Me. You rob Me of My tithes. You rob Me of My offerings.”
A tithe is one tenth of all their increase. Heave offerings were their gifts to God, an expression of their gratitude and their voluntary vows to God. They were neglected.
Not that they did not bring anything to the house. They probably brought something, but not the whole tithe. So God’s word to them was, “Bring the whole tithe.”
If they did not bring anything, probably their conscience would bother them. But because they brought something, their conscience was all right.
Brothers and sisters, when their love for God grew cold, no wonder they did not care too much about God’s house.
Probably they had a reason. They said, “Because we did not produce enough, we hardly had enough to support ourselves. We could only give God the surplus. We needed everything.”
But do you not know that the reason you did not have enough was because you were under a curse? “If you bring the whole tithe to God’s house, try Me, prove Me; I will open the windows of heaven and bless you abundantly. You will not be lacking.”
Of course, brothers and sisters, in New Testament times there is no law concerning these things. In the New Testament, God loves a cheerful giver. We must give cheerfully to the Lord as an expression of our love toward Him.
Everything belongs to Him. God loves a cheerful giver. Before we give, we need first to give ourselves to the Lord, and then our things.
Like the Macedonians, they gave beyond their ability because they loved God. In other words, with us today it is not a matter of law; it is a matter of love.
But we must remember that we, too, can rob God.
We may rob God of our time. We may rob God of our service. We may rob God of our life. Our life belongs to Him.
But how are we robbing Him? We use our own life instead of allowing our life to be completely devoted to Him. We use our life without God.
We may rob God of our time. Our time belongs to God, but what time do we give Him? The leftover time.
We may rob God of our service. We do not serve Him as we should. We may rob God of His glory. We may do something and receive the glory ourselves instead of giving all the glory to God.
We can rob God, you know. We can rob Him.
Brothers and sisters, I believe here is a matter of priority. What is first in your life, in your concern?
But seek ye first His kingdom, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
If we seek our own interests first, we will be in lack, and you will find that there is not enough to give to God. You can only give to God what is left.
But if we seek God first, if our priority is settled, all these things shall be added unto us. It is a matter of priority.
Are we a people who are supposed to live for God, supposed to serve God? But look at our situation. Does He have the priority in our life? Is that true? Is that real?
Now, that is the issue. We need to repent in this respect.
Finally, in Malachi 3:14:
Your words have been stout against Me, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, What have we spoken against Thee?
Ye have said, It is vain to serve God; and what profit is it that we have kept His charge, and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts?
And now we call the proud happy; yea, they that work wickedness are built up; yea, they tempt God, and escape.
How stout were their words against God! Basically, they said, “It is vain to serve God. What profit do we get?”
“Look at other people. They do evil and escape. Here we are; we serve God. What do we have? What do we get?”
Very much like their father Jacob. You know, Jacob always had a bargaining spirit. Jacob said, “Now, Lord, if Thou wilt bless me with this and that, then I will do something for Thee.”
He was always bargaining—a mercenary spirit, a bargaining spirit with God. But thank God, God changed him into Israel, a prince with God.
You remember even Peter one day. He told the Lord, “Lord, we have left everything to follow Thee. What shall we have therefore?”
The Lord said, “You will receive a hundredfold—and persecutions.” But the Lord said, “The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.”
How easy it is for us to develop a bargaining spirit within us. Yes, we are serving Him, but what will we get?
“It is vain to serve because we get nothing. We are not profiting. So why serve?”
While the remnant were saying these almost blasphemous words, thank God, there were a few who feared God and encouraged each other. They talked to one another about God.
The Lord said, “I observe. I hear. I record it in the book of My remembrance.”
Brothers and sisters, we are approaching the last days, and even people who are serving the Lord may be serving for profit. “What will we get? What do we get?”
We want to get something out of the Lord. But do we love Him and serve Him with a pure heart?
Let us encourage one another—not for profit, but for the Lord Himself. How we need to encourage one another.
Everything is recorded in the book of remembrance. When the Lord shall come back, all these things will be brought out, and by His grace we shall shine in His kingdom.
But if we are wicked in our heart, then when He shall return, we cannot enter into the joys of the Lord.
So, brothers and sisters, here you find that the Old Testament is concluded with its last word: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet.”
That is the Old Testament—the law and the prophets. The law and the prophets lead us to Christ. That is the conclusion of the Old Testament: that we may see Christ. That is God’s purpose.
Lord, speak to us. Deliver us from all that cannot meet Thine eyes.
Give us a spirit of repentance, that we may be restored and recovered.
O Lord, may Thy sufficient grace restore us and maintain us in the place where we may be a praise to Thy name.
O Lord, we do praise and thank Thee for Thy patience. We praise and thank Thee for Thy work.
Teach us how to cooperate, to submit, and to learn. We ask in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.