MONDAY, 22 February, 2021 “Broken Dreams”

Good Monday morning to you my “Walking with Jesus” friends,

How important to you is someone’s PROMISE? In years gone by, some ‘old-timers’ would say, ‘I don’t need a contract, my word is my bond and I’ll stand by my word to the death.’ Have you ever heard anyone say something like that? And what about the opposite?… “I know I promised, but I’ve changed my mind and I don’t want to honor that promise. I expect you to release me from my commitment as I would release you if you had a change of heart.” How many times have you been wounded by a broken promise?

We are together in the last little book of the Old Testament in the Bible, and we’re considering some important final words from God. Why do I call them “final words”? Because after Mr. Malachi finished his messages of warning to the people of Israel, God went silent. Oh God was still fully Sovereign God doing all the remarkable things He has always done to keep the Universe functioning, and creating thousands of new babies everyday, and sustaining every living human being… but God was NOT speaking to humanity with any fresh words. No prophet, no priest, no king, not anyone claimed to have a fresh word from God for 400 years after Malachi!!!!

Have you ever felt God was silent as you sought an answer from God? That’s why we are listening these days to Mr. Malachi and seeking to understand how his words of warning apply to our time, and where you and I live.

Join me today in Malachi 2:10-16 “Do we not all have one Father? Did not one God create us? Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being unfaithful to one another?” Malachi was right! No human being created themselves. God is the originator of EVERY conception, everywhere in the world, in every generation! No fetus is conceived without God’s direct, miraculous intervention. Do you agree, my friends? And that is why ‘abortion’ or whatever you choose to call the forceable cessation of the life of a God conceived fetus before birth or even after birth is MURDER. Murder is the killing of a life you didn’t create and you have no authority to kill.

Through Malachi God is challenging everyone then and now with two profound questions. The answer to the first is simple, even a child knows it. YES… God miraculously created all of us, each of us, one person at a time, and thus we have one “Father”…Almighty, Creator God! The answer to the second question is more complicated “Why do we profane the covenant of our ancestors by being unfaithful to one another?” In Malachi 2:11 & 12, God is challenging Jewish men to acknowledge that they have profaned the covenant their ancestors made with God that they would NOT marry any women who was not Jewish, a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Jacob’s sons. That covenant had been made several times, beginning way back in the days of Moses. (Deuteronomy 7:3) It had been reaffirmed as a covenant as recently as one generation earlier in the days of Ezra. You’ll find that in Ezra 9&10 and Nehemiah 10:30

Listen to Malachi’s words: “As for the man who does this, whoever he may be, may the LORD remove him from the tents of Jacob – even though he brings an offering to the LORD Almighty.” (Mal. 3:12) Do you see the price of breaking their covenant here? They were to be excluded from the family of the Israelites. They were to be expelled from the Jewish towns and villages where they lived.

Do you also notice something important? Bringing sizable offerings to the Temple of God was not reason to excuse their breaking of the covenant. They were guilty. Oh my friends they hadn’t just made a little mistake. They hadn’t just broken a promise. This was a COVENANT between the Jewish people and God, and many Jewish men had premeditated, with full understanding, broken their covenant by marrying idol worshipping women from foreign peoples. It was a mockery of the covenant and of God.

Do you see what else Malachi points out? Look at verse 13 “Another thing you do: You flood the LORD’s altar with tears. You weep and wail because God no longer looks with favor upon your offerings or accepts them with pleasure from your hands. You ask “WHY?” It is because the LORD is witness between you and your wife of your youth. You have been unfaithful to her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant! Has not the LORD made them one? In flesh and in spirit they are His. And why one? Because God was seeking godly offspring. So guard yourself in your spirit and do not break faith with the wife of your youth. “I hate divorce” says the LORD God of Israel. The man who divorces his wife’, says the God of Israel, ‘does violence to the one he should protect. So guard yourself in your spirit and do not break faith.” (Mal. 2:13-16)

Oh my, this is very clear isn’t it? In Israel, not only were Jewish men marrying idol worshipping women from foreign nations, some Jewish men were abandoning their Jewish wives, getting certificates of divorce and marrying other women for no significant reason. Do you notice God challenging these adults to consider that in HIS eyes, the primary purpose of a God honoring marriage was raising up godly offspring! God honoring couples, building God honoring families into which God could birth babies who would grow up knowing, loving and honoring God and then they would do the same and build the next generation of God honoring families!

But instead, selfish divorce was breaking the hearts of children and young people, and they were growing up wounded and without a clear understanding of what a God honoring, covenant keeping marriage and home was! God condemned all this behavior as a mockery of His design for God honoring marriage and family.

Now I ask you my friends, are you a promise keeping person? Do you know the difference between a promise and a vow or a covenant? A vow or covenant is breakable in the eyes of God only by death! In a marriage ceremony the man and woman being married do not exchange promises or even ‘hopes’, they exchange VOWS, and most vows are written ‘till death separates us’!! Now look around the world where you live. How are marriage vows being treated? How much damage do you see the breakup of families has created in children? And what is God saying to us, His people, through Malachi in 2021?

I think it’s time to pray… right now, each of us, privately and humbly, with God who has watched every moment of your life and mine, and knows the true condition of our hearts and minds. What does God want to say to you and me, our kids and grandkids about this matter of PROMISES!? I urge you to read these verses carefully, prayerfully and listen to what the Holy Spirit says to you. Then worship, with this song. . .

Today’s Scripture is Malachi 2.

Choose below to read or listen.

Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.

Have a comment or question about today’s chapter? I’m ready to hear from you, contact me here.

Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)

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