Hear! Take it to heart! Give glory to My Name! The goal of everyone of us who knows the Lord is to glorify HIM, and to lead others to do the same. God created us for His glory! We do best for God, for neighbor and ourselves when we glorify the Lord.
In John 7:18, Jesus said, “He who speaks from himself seeks his own glory; but He who seeks the glory of the One who sent Him is true, and no unrighteousness is in Him.” In John 12:28, Jesus prayed, “Father, glorify Your Name!” In John 17:1, Jesus looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son may glorify YOU.”
The priests of Israel lacked love for God, for their people, and for their spouses. They were not teaching the people the Laws of God by which blessings would come to them. God tells them to take His warning to heart or else He would curse them. In fact, they already were under a curse in that they no longer had a heart for God and His Word.
In Leviticus 10:11, the Lord spoke to Aaron, saying, “You must teach the Israelites all the statutes that the Lord has given them through Moses.” In Haggai 2:11, the Lord said, “Ask the priests concerning the Law.”
Even parents were to teach God’s commandments to their children. In Deuteronomy 6:7-9, God told parents to diligently teach His commands to their children, talking about them constantly—when sitting, walking, lying down, and rising. In Psalm 78:4-8, parents tell their children the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord. They do not want their children to forget God as past generations did and suffered greatly because of it. In Ephesians 6:4, the Lord instructs fathers to bring their children up in the “training and admonition of the Lord.”
In Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28, the Lord told people which blessings and curses they could expect due to adherence or non-adherence to His guidance.
“Behold, I will rebuke your descendants and spread refuse on your faces, the refuse of your solemn feasts; and one will take you away with it. Then you shall know that I have sent this commandment to you, that My covenant with Levi may continue, says the Lord of hosts. My covenant was with him, one of life and peace, and I gave them to him that he might fear Me. So, he feared Me and was reverent before My Name. The law of truth was in his mouth, and injustice was not found on his lips. He walked with Me in peace and equity and turned many away from iniquity.” Malachi 2:3-6
The Lord called the priests in Malachi’s day to get back on track with the former Levite priests who did have the law of truth in their mouths. They spoke up for justice. They maintained a peaceful relationship with God rather than a turbulent one. They turned people from sin to right behavior.
“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. But you have departed from the way. You have caused many to stumble at the Law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore I also have made you contemptible and base before all the people, because you have not kept My ways but have shown partiality in the Law.” Malachi 2:7-9
The priests were to teach people the knowledge of God. Who else was going to do it? Babies are not born with the Bible in them. How will they know what God has said about them and about the world unless someone teaches them? The Law of God was not in the priests either, so how could they impart it to someone. They were messengers of God without His message.
Has someone ever given you wrong directions? As a result, you got lost and suffered loss? That’s what these priests were doing. They were blind guides trying to lead the blind. People were stumbling and getting hurt. Therefore, they no longer trusted their shepherds. In fact, they developed contempt for priests. Anyone could see that they were untrustworthy.
“Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us? Why do we deal treacherously with one another by profaning the covenant of the fathers? Judah has dealt treacherously, and an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem, for Judah has profaned the Lord’s holy institution which He loves: he has married the daughter of a foreign god. May the Lord cut off from the tents of Jacob the man who does this, being awake and aware, yet who brings an offering to the Lord of hosts!” Malachi 2:10-12
If the priests truly knew God as their father and Creator, He would have directed them to teach and serve their flock with integrity. In 1 Kings 14:8, the Lord said of His servant David, “He kept My commands and followed Me with all his heart, doing only what was right in My eyes.” What was the outcome of such zeal for the Lord? Psalm 78:72 says, “David shepherded them [Israel] with integrity of heart; with skillful hands he led them.” When we are right with the Lord, He helps us to do what is right for the people who look to us for leadership.
They profaned the covenant of the fathers, that is, marriage. Marriage is a holy institution before the Lord. In 1 Corinthians 7:36, the Lord says, “If anyone is worried that he might not be acting honorably toward the virgin he is engaged to, and if his passions are too strong and he feels he ought to marry, he should do as he wants. He is not sinning. They should get married.” A lifelong commitment to one another should happen before intimate relationships happen. The Lord says in Hebrews 13:4, “Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.”
The priests in Malachi’s day, had married foreign wives who did not believe in their God. In Deuteronomy 7:3-4, God said that intermarriage with the inhabitants of the Promised Land was strictly forbidden. God did not want Israelite sons and daughters to worship other gods. He promised to destroy those who broke this commandment. This prohibition wasn’t about ethnicity but about faith. The New Testament affirms this law. In 2 Corinthians 6:14-15, the Lord said, “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? Or what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever?”
I like the imagery of a married couple being yokefellows. Farmers carefully choose which oxen they put together under one yoke. Two yoked oxen need to be well-matched in size, strength, and temperament, moving at the same pace, in the same direction, and sharing a common commitment to the work for the yoke to function effectively and prevent injury or frustration, essentially requiring them to be aligned in purpose and effort. [G]
“And this is the second thing you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and crying; so He does not regard the offering anymore, nor receive it with goodwill from your hands. Yet you say, ‘For what reason?’ because the Lord has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, with whom you have dealt treacherously; yet she is your companion and your wife by covenant. But did He not make them one, having a remnant of the Spirit? And why one? He seeks godly offspring. Therefore take heed to your spirit and let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth.” Malachi 2:13-15
The priests wondered why God was not paying attention to their tears, weeping and crying. God gave them no indication that He appreciated their offerings. It was because they betrayed the wives of their youth, that is, their first and true wives. They made covenants with their spouses but did not keep them. They broke trust with them. In 1 Peter 3:7, the Lord says to husbands, “Be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers.”
In Genesis 2:24, God says a husband and wife become one flesh. In Matthew 19:5, Jesus taught, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”
Why did God make the married couple one flesh? Malachi 2:14 says, “He seeks godly offspring.” God designed man and a woman to become one to produce children. He wants them to work together to help their children become reflections of God, that is, godly.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 says, “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.” So, husband and wife should tag team in raising their children. This is just as true for pastors as it is for non-pastors.
“For the Lord God of Israel says that He hates divorce, for it covers one’s garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore take heed to your spirit, that you do not deal treacherously. You have wearied the Lord with your words; yet you say, ‘In what way have we wearied Him?’ In that you say, ‘Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He delights in them,’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’” Malachi 2:16-17
God hates divorce because a marriage between a man and woman is to glorify the relationship between Christ and His Church, that is, an everlasting relationship. In Ephesians 5:25, the Lord says to husbands, “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her.” In Ephesians 5:33, the Lord says to wives, “The wife must respect her husband.” The Lord wants married couples to love each other deeply. They are to model for their children how a husband and a wife love one another. They are to model for them how to be parents that both care for and work toward the well-being of their children.
The priests in Malachi’s day made the Lord angry. They were saying that everyone who does evil in God’s sight is good. “He delights in them.” They lost touch with the God of justice. Surely, if someone mistreated them as they mistreated their spouses and their sheep, they would change their minds. Bullies and abusive people tend to lack empathy. They don’t feel the pain that they cause others until someone abuses them in a similar fashion.
Let us pray as 1 Timothy 2:1-2 says to do: “Pray for all who are in authority that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.” People don’t know what they don’t know. Sometimes even when God and His messengers try to address unloving behaviors, the offenders still don’t see it or agree to it. They need God to reveal to them what is wrong. They need God to give them the strength to face up to the realities that hitherto they were unwilling to face.
Some have found Ezekiel 36:26 to be a good divine promise to pray when someone needs a new heart. The Lord says, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” Let us pray for pastors, for marriages and for all of us people to love the Lord with all our hearts. “In our lives Lord, be glorified!”
[G] Google sources
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