Elected By God’s Grace - Malachi 1

“The burden of the Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved you, says the Lord. Yet you say, ‘In what way have You loved us?’ Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? says the Lord. Yet Jacob I have loved; but Esau I have hated and laid waste his mountains and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness.” Malachi 1:1-3

“I have loved you, says the Lord.” How many of us have hoped in times past that someone really wonderful would love us? Here, the Lord tells the people of Israel that He loves them. The Lord is beyond wonderful! Are they awestruck? Are they grateful? Do they respond in like fashion to the Lord? No, they question God. They say to God, “Wherein have You loved us?”

Perhaps, in their minds, they only considered the ways in which their ego had been bruised by events in their past, and did not realize how those very events were designed by God to keep them from a greater harm, namely hell. Were they victims or survivors? They were survivors. They still had breath in their lungs, ground below their feet, and daily provisions for survival. Plus, they had God in their lives in special ways like no other people on earth.

Instead of loving God for loving them, they challenged Him to produce signs of His love.

Did the Israelites want to know what it looks and feels like to be unfavored by God? They needed to look at what happened to their brethren the Edomites. Edom was not rebuilt after the Babylonian captivity period.

Do you know the origins of Israel and Edom? These two nations began as twin boys born to Isaac and Rebekah. The Lord spoke to Rebekah. In Genesis 25:23, He told her, “Two nations are in your womb, two peoples shall be separated from your body. One people shall be stronger than the other, and the older shall serve the younger.”

When God reveals to us what He is going to accomplish through us, we need not help Him to bring it to pass. God is well able to accomplish what He sets out to do. We do need to be patient. We need to believe His Word even when it seems impossible to come to pass.

For example, in Genesis 15:5 and reiterated in Genesis 22:17, God promised Abraham and Sarah descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven and as the sand of the seashore. They waited many years. Romans 4:19 says that Abraham considered his own body now as good as dead (he being about a 100 years old), and the deadness of Sarah’s womb (she being around 90). Then, Sarah decided to help make God’s promises come true faster by giving Abraham her servant Hagar with whom he could start a family. So what did Abraham do? He complied. Thus, Ishmael was born. Afterwards, Sarah did conceive and give birth to a son named Isaac.

Genesis 21:1-2 says, “Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as He had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him.” Isaac’s coming forth from a dead womb was a foreshadowing of Christ resurrecting from a tomb after being dead three days. Remember: all God’s promises and miracles are meant in the grand scheme of things to glorify Jesus Christ.

The Lord revealed to Rebekah that two nations were in her womb, and that the older would serve the younger. In Genesis 27, Rebekah decided to help God out. She urged Jacob to deceive his father Isaac to bring about God’s plan. The outcome was bad. Jacob had to flee from his brother who wanted to kill him. The Bible never mentions if Rebekah was alive when Jacob returned from Haran some 20 years later. Even so, God was faithful to bring about His promise to Rebekah, Israel grew stronger and eventually Edom ceased to exist.

The stories of Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob and Esau illustrate the truth that God reveals to us in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. Not of works, lest anyone should boast.” In regards to Messiah, God brought about His promise to Israel in spite of their insufficient faith in Him.

Malachi prophesied to Isreal after they had returned to the Promised Land from Babylon. Their capital Jerusalem was rebuilt. Their temple to the Lord was rebuilt. Life was better for them. But Edom had been utterly destroyed by Babylon and by the Egyptians, Ammonites, and Moabites. Esau’s cities were never rebuilt.

In Romans 9:10-13, Paul uses God’s election of Jacob rather than Esau to illustrate the point that election is a result of God’s choice and has nothing to do with the elected person’s effort or his or her intrinsic value being of greater worth than the other. Paul wrote, “For the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls.” God can and does elect whom He will use to bring Him glory. It is not up to us to make that decision for God.

In Romans 9:2, Paul laments over Israel’s treatment of God. He wrote, “I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart.” God chose Isreal to be His special treasure above all nations on earth. In Romans 9:4-5, Paul wrote, “To whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came.” What did Israel do with this election? They rejected it for gods and doctrines of their own making. They hated, beat and killed the prophets that God sent to them. They crucified His Son.

Thankfully, God lets us know in the Bible, especially in Romans 11 and Revelation 7, 14, 20-22, that He still has a wonderful plan for Israel. His elected people will win. Thanks to His grace, long-suffering and depths of His unfathomable love.

God executed justice on the Edomites. He laid their mountains to waste. Their country became a habitation for dragons.

“Even though Edom has said, ‘We have been impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places,’ thus says the Lord of hosts: they may build, but I will throw down. They shall be called the Territory of Wickedness, and the people against whom the Lord will have indignation forever. Your eyes shall see, and you shall say, ‘The Lord is magnified beyond the border of Israel.’” Malachi 1:4-5

God allowed humble circumstances to come Edom’s way, but they did not humble themselves before Him. They believed that they could build back better by shear human volition and might. God declared, “They shall be called the Territory of Wickedness.” His anger was against them.

“Those that walk contrary to God will find that He will walk contrary to them. Who has hardened his heart against God and prospered? When the Jews had rejected Christ and His Gospel they became Edomites, and this word was fulfilled in them. In the time of the emperor Adrian, they attempted to rebuild Jerusalem, God by earthquakes and eruptions of fire threw down what they built, so that they were forced to quit the enterprise.” [JFBC]

Malachi 1:5 says, “The Lord is and will be magnified from the border of Israel.” In His own time and in His own way, God gave His people cause, and hearts, to praise Him. Ecclesiastes 3:11 says, “He [God] has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.” We must get past our desire to be God. He doesn’t let us know everything that He knows for a good reason. We just need to trust Him as a child trusts a faithful father.

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am the Father, where is My honor? And if I am a Master, where is My reverence? says the Lord of hosts to you priests who despise My Name. Yet you say, ‘In what way have we despised Your Name?’” Malachi 1:6

If the priests truly regarded God as their Father and Master, their respect for Him would have shown. They despised His Name. When someone loves somebody, that somebody’s name is like music to his or her ears. The priests were guilty of breaking God’s great commandment. They did not love the Lord their God with all their hearts, minds, strength and souls.

Isaac Watts in his book entitled, “Humility: Adopting Paul’s ‘Less Than the Least’ Mindset,” wrote, “The pleasures of sin are not subdued by denying ourselves all enjoyment, but by tasting higher and better joys that make sinful pleasures lose their power.” Instead of feeding selfish desires, we should feed selfless ones. Watts quoted Philippians 2:3-11 in which God urges us to be like Christ. Jesus did nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit. He maintained a lowly mind in terms of esteeming others better than Himself. He considered the interests of others. He became of no reputation. He took on the form of a servant. He was willing to die a cruel death so that others could enjoy paradise. He was willing to be stripped naked on a cross so others could be clothed in the righteousness of God. Watts declares that love for God and love for others is more fulfilling than ceaseless focus on gratifying one’s own ego.

“You offer defiled food on My altar, but say, ‘In what way have we defiled You?’ by saying, ‘The table of the Lord is contemptible.’ And when you offer the blind as a sacrifice, is it not evil? And when you offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? Offer it then to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you favorably? says the Lord of hosts.” Malachi 1:7-8

Darius, and probably his successors, had liberally supplied the Jews with animals for their sacrifices, yet they presented only the worst of these to the Lord. God is love. He wants His people to love deeply as He loves. “God despises not the widow’s mite, but He does despise the miser’s mite.” [JFBC]

They picked out the worst they had, which was fit neither for the market nor for their own tables and offered that at God’s altar. According to Malachi 1:7-8, 13, they brought the blind, and the lame, and the sick, that which was ready to die of itself. They brought polluted bread, servants’ bread, perhaps it was dry and moldy, or made of throwaway wheat. [JFBC]

This is like unto the imaginary story of the one dollar bill and the hundred dollar bill. The two bills were talking with one another. The hundred dollar bill boasted of all the exotic places he had been while the one dollar bill said that he spent most of his time in church offering plates.

“But now entreat God’s favor, that He may be gracious to us. While this is being done by your hands, will He accept you favorably? says the Lord of hosts. Who is there even among you who would shut the doors, so that you would not kindle fire on My altar in vain? I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, nor will I accept an offering from your hands. For from the rising of the sun, even to its going down, My Name shall be great among the Gentiles. In every place incense shall be offered to My Name, and a pure offering. For My Name shall be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts.” Malachi 1:9-11

The priests of Israel would not even do the least of priestly functions such as shutting the doors or kindling a fire on the altar. That’s like a spouse who does not even the simplest of task of kindness to demonstrate love to the other but expects the other to serve hand and foot.

To the Jewish priests and people who despised God’s Name, God told them that His Name shall be great among the Gentiles. This is like what Jesus said to the Jews in Matthew 8:10-12, “Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel! And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

We Christians in the west need to take heed to this warning. There are people in other nations who highly regard Jesus. They treat Him with the utmost respect and service. What kind of offerings are we bringing to Jesus? Are we loving the Lord? Are we trusting in Him?

“But you profane it, in that you say, ‘The table of the Lord is defiled; and its fruit, its food, is contemptible.’ You also say, ‘Oh, what a weariness!’ And you sneer at it, says the Lord of hosts. And you bring the stolen, the lame, and the sick; thus you bring an offering! Should I accept this from your hand? says the Lord. But cursed be the deceiver who has in his flock a male, and takes a vow, but sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished—for I am a great King, says the Lord of hosts, and My Name is to be feared among the nations.” Malachi 1:12-14

The people needed an attitude adjustment. It has been said that attitude determines altitude.

God did not bring up these charges against Israel with evil intentions. He wanted them to consider the choices they were making. They were choosing not to fear, love and trust God with all their hearts. What did that do for them? It was defiling each of them and their nation. They became like the undesirable offerings that they brought to God... lame, blind and sick.

God addressed their love problem because He wanted to help them out. All they needed to do was humble themselves, confess their sins, ask God to forgive them, and welcome Him to save and transform them by His grace.

It is by God’s grace that anyone of us is saved and transformed. May our praise, glory and adoration be unto Him.





[JFBC] = Jamieson Fausset Brown Commentary