Important Lessons from Malachi.
By Uriah Smith
In the Hebrew Bible, the prophecy of Malachi does not stand, as in our version, as the last book of the Old Testament. But Malachi was the last of the Old Testament prophets. After his voice had been raised in impetuous and fiery denunciation of sin; after resistless exhortations to duty had been given; after stirring and solemn proclamation of the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord had been set before the world, and all men had been reined up to stand face to face with the day that was coming, which should burn as an oven, and in which all that do wickedly, and all the proud should be stubble, and be burned up root and branch,—silence dropped upon the scene,—a silence that continued for four hundred years, till at length in the wilderness of Judea a voice was heard proclaiming, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” There is a break in the time, but no break in the continuity of thought; for the New Testament begins in a manner to show that it is but a continuation of the Old; a further development of the great theme which had constituted the burden of psalmists, prophets, and holy men, who had spoken as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. The prophecy of Malachi, who was the last of the great line of ancient prophets, gives strong utterance of the “hope of Israel.” In his prophecy there is a culmination of the world’s Messianic hope, so far as it could be given before the appearance of the Messiah himself, to re-affirm the purpose of God, so strongly set forth in the Old Testament, to form a spiritual kingdom in the World, submissive to his government, obedient to his law, and to gather the members and the citizens of this government out of all countries and peoples of the earth. Such a conception was not possible to the Egyptian, the Greek, or the Roman; and it was possible to the Jew only because he was instructed concerning it by the spirit of revelation given unto him by a long line of divine teachers. The Bible indicates who the head of this kingdom is to be; a personality, supreme both in character and in power. He was at first dimly foreshadowed out of the distance and darkness of remote ages, but is more and more distinctly brought to view through the continually increasing radiance of prophecy, through the voice of psalmists, through the solemn and impressive ceremonies of the sanctuary service, through the office of the priesthood, and through the royal majesty and supremacy of kings. So the prophecies grow more and more definite concerning him. He is first revealed as the seed of the woman, then as the seed of Abraham, then as the star out of Jacob, as coming out of Judah, and the son of David. Then prophecy, as in the book of Daniel, begins to focus itself upon the very time when he should appear; and, as in Isaiah, upon the very place of his revelation; and then, as in Micah, upon the very character and office he was to fulfill and exhibit, till the Old Testament closes with the last sound of its prophecy through Malachi, predicting the coming of the great Refiner to his temple; the gathering out of God’s jewels from the rubbish of the world; the coming of the great day of the Lord, that shall burn as an oven; and the final rising of the Sun of righteousness, with healing in his wings. Thus the last voice of the Old Testament declares the coming of the Sun of righteousness, the great orb that shall usher in the eternal day; and the New Testament, five hundred years later, responds, “Even so, come, Lord Jesus.” And eighteen hundred years later still, even in our own day, the same cry is echoing through the earth, “Come, Lord Jesus,” “come quickly,” and with increasing fervor; for now the time for the glorious event is almost up. While many of the exhortations of Malachi were applicable to his own time, they have been pertinent to conditions that have arisen all through the ages, and that exist to-day. Take for example the words of chapter 3, verse 7: “Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of Hosts. But ye say, Wherein shall we return?” Here is a warning and a promise applicable to every age, and a revelation of the excuse which ever hangs on backsliding lips: Oh, what have we done so bad? wherein have we departed from the Lord? and wherein have we occasion to return? But the Lord does not give us much opportunity to grow captious; for he immediately adds, “and I will return unto you.” This disposition to justify self, and argue the case with the Lord, we meet continually in our own time. Although God never changes, yet man does change; and when man changes his attitude toward God, it makes it seem as if God changed his attitude toward him. The writer once heard a youth ventilating his first crude lessons in skepticism, at the close of a meeting in Michigan. “What use,” he said, “is it to pray? It is all foolishness. Do you think you can change the mind of God, to make him comply with your requests?” A friend answered him, “Does not God often suspend promised blessings upon conditions, in order to draw out our mind and feelings toward him, in such a way that if we comply, we receive the things we desire, but not caring enough about them to comply, God consistently withholds them?—Yes; why, you do that even with your dog. You tell him to ‘speak,’ if he would receive the proffered bone. If he complies, he gets it; if he refuses, he goes without. Did your dog change your mind?—No; you had your mind all made up to that before; if any change took place, it was on the part of the dog. Now would you like to have your dog go away growling about you that it was no use to ask you for a bone, because you would not change?” So it is not a change on the part of God, but a change on our part toward him. These apparent changes are common to nature. We say that the sun rises and the sun sets. But relatively to our earth the sun does not move, the Rev. Jasper to the contrary, notwithstanding; but the earth moves relatively to the sun. By revolving on its axis, it makes the sun appear to sweep the whole compass of the heavens from the east to the west. The change is not in the sun, but in the earth. Just so with our relation to God, as affected by prayer. If a man looks toward God, he sees the loving face of his Father; but if the man turns his back on God, he misses that loving face; and then he is inclined to think that God has become his enemy. The change is not in God; the change is only in himself. There is only one cure for such trouble as this; and that is for the changeful man to turn back again to the unchanging God. In answer to the question, “Wherein shall we return?” the Lord puts the searching question, “Will a man rob God?” What! a poor, mortal, dependent man try to defraud and cheat the Almighty! The thought is paralyzing. But how may we rob God? Heaven is not the only domain of God’s vast property. The earth, and all that is therein, belongs to him. Ourselves, and all that we have and are, belong to him. We have feelings, emotions, affections, purposes, and plans. These will run out and fasten on things all around us, lawful or unlawful. In all these things God rightfully comes in for his appropriate share. But how many give, in their minds, to one or all of these things the all-comprehensive and absorbing place, and leave God entirely out! Such are certainly robbing God. The first installment of that message which is a current living message for the church to-day, is, “Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come.” Fear, of the most filial, reverential, solemn kind, is due to God. Then what of the tenderer, gentler emotions and affections, love, confidence, gratitude, humble dependence on the Giver of all blessings? All these will go out and twine about something. Must they attach themselves to, and be absorbed by, some of the few, and unworthy objects nearest us, and be lost in them, while God, the one thing needful, is passed by unheeded?—To follow this course is indeed robbing God. Must it be that to the perfection of beauty, and excellence, and the supreme goodness, and to these alone, our souls shall be indifferent, and insensible, while trifling toys enlist all our powers? It is not for his own sake that God requests our homage and obedience, but for our own sake. But the good intended for ourselves we lose in robbing10God. For, through the great and inevitable law of compensation, men iniquitously and fatally rob themselves, by dealing thus parsimoniously with the Lord. The motto of true Christian life is sacrificial surrender, and that to God. Alexander Maclaren says: “Malachi necessarily keeps within the limits of the sacrificial system. But his impetuous eloquence hits us no less. It is still possible to rob God. We do so when we keep anything as our own, and use it at our own will, for our own purposes. Only when we recognize his [God’s] ownership of ourselves, and, consequently, of all that we call ‘ours,’ do we give him his due.” To the cynical query, “Wherein have we robbed thee?” the Lord replies, “In tithes and offerings.” Then he tells us how to recover ourselves from the wrong, and how to return unto him. “Bring ye all the tithes,” he says, “into the storehouse.” The Revised Version reads, “Bring ye the whole tithe into the storehouse.” We hear considerable said among men about a “dishonest tithe.” The idea is well intended, but the language is hardly accurate; for if there is anything less than a full tenth rendered, it is not a tithe at all. The sin aimed at evidently is that of the reducing or cutting short of that which is offered as a tithe, claiming that that is the whole, when it is only part. Is not that the very thing which Ananias and Sapphira did? We fear, if justice were meted out in the same unswerving and rigid manner to-day, as then, there would be many whom, cut down by the visitation of God, it would be necessary to carry out for burial. The Lord pleads with us through the prophet Malachi, not to act in that way. Do not try to deceive, but bring a whole tithe into the storehouse; and he so longs to bless us, that he challenges us to try him, and prove him, and see if he will not open the sluice-ways of heaven, and pour out such a blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it. Not always, perhaps, will it be fulfilled in increase of outward goods, but if not, it will be in the better riches of communion and of larger possessions of God himself. In the language of T. L. Cuyler, “Self has got hold of the purse strings; and the Lord is likely to be robbed of his dues. That is the secret of the diminished contributions in our churches; and that accounts for the fact that, while the church is growing richer, so many grand institutions for the spread of his kingdom are often at the starvation point. The lust of the eye and the pride of life steal in, and, under smooth phrases, commit their shameful larcenies of the moneys which God loans to his stewards. When Christians undertake to cheat God, their sin is sure, sooner or later, to find them out.” In every department of human life, God requires his proprietorship to be recognized. The seventh day is hallowed to his service. The first fruits of the corn were to be devoted to religious uses. The firstborn in the household belonged to God, and was to be redeemed by substitution. And of all yearly gains, one tenth is claimed by God, as his. This is just and right; for he is absolute proprietor, and has simply put us in possession for a limited time to use his property for him. We may keep back part of the consecrated price; but the loss will be ours, not the Lord’s. We may even plume ourselves as being financially very clever, even talented and model financiers in securing increased gains by cutting short the Lord’s portion. But in this the law already referred to—the great law of compensation, which is still operative—will work disastrously for us; for the divine rule plainly stated is this: “He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly.” And the converse of this is also plainly expressed: “And he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully.” We may imagine that all God’s benefactions are wholly of a spiritual nature; and so may have shut him out from field and shop and vineyard; but listen to his words: “The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy storehouses, and in all that thou settest thy hand unto; and he shall bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.” God will recognize those who recognize him. All blessings are suspended upon conditions; while we acknowledge gratefully God’s bounty, we should be careful not to make the performance of our religious obligations a matter of commerce. U. S.