Purified Before You're Vindicated

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[0:00] Well, let's begin. Our sermon is from Malachi, and this is the Old Testament reading for this Sunday of Advent. And I think what's good is we're just, I guess right now, and I'm in a phase where I just want to preach the Old Testament parts of the lectionary to expose us to them because we see these often.

[0:17] And so, broadly speaking, this is the second Sunday of Advent where we kind of focus on John the Baptist as one who comes to prepare the way for Jesus. And we know that John did that. He was out in the wilderness baptizing people for the forgiveness of sins, calling people to account out there in the wilderness.

[0:37] And so, these Old Testament figures mentioned in Isaiah, but also in Malachi, the New Testament writers say John is the fulfillment of that expectation of some messenger that's going to come before God's reappearing. And so, they have linked John to Jesus.

[0:57] And so, these Old Testament figures mentioned in Isaiah, but also in Malachi, the New Testament writers say John is the fulfillment of that expectation of some messenger that's going to come before God's reappearing. I want to talk just really quickly about Malachi. Malachi, we believe, wrote in what we call the post-exilic period, the post-exile period, maybe around 515 BC. So, this is after the people who had been exiled to Babylon, they were sent home. Many of them were sent home. Many of them were sent home. by the ruler of Persia, and so they were allowed to kind of repatriate the land.

[1:32] But they weren't an independent nation. They were still a vassal state of Persia. And this was a really difficult time, and this is something that's important to understand about this time, this post-exilic period. It was a time of great conflict, potentially, in Israel. And the reason is that all these people who went to Babylon, they were gone for 70-some years, and while they were there, they developed. They actually developed in Judaism. They developed it more. They began to commit a lot of the scriptures to paper. Before that, a lot of it was probably an oral tradition. So they came back with, they had been living somewhere else. They came back with some new traditions. But who was there when they came back? There were a great number of people who weren't exiled in the first place, and they had developed their own sort of culture in the absence of these other people. So they were back and they were all Jews and they all wanted to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. They all wanted to rebuild the temple, but they kind of had to sort of cooperate with each other. And that was challenging. And then in those 70 years, there was a whole nother group of people who kind of migrated into the land and intermarried with some of these people who stayed. And so that was yet a

[2:44] third group. And so you can kind of get the sense of sort of a three-way loggerhead here in Jerusalem, in the area around Jerusalem, of competing interests. They had some things in common. They wanted to worship. But whenever people from different cultures kind of have to live side by side, friction always comes. And so Malachi is definitely in the context of this conflict. And there's conflict and there's upset. And so there were three groups of people, like I said. They needed to share the land. They needed to find an identity that was larger than the three of them individually. They needed to find a way to get them to get to Jerusalem. And so they were way to communicate and they needed to find a way to worship together. And so there were problems.

[3:26] And there were questions. And this is what Malachi kind of is about. They were saying, where is God in this? How is God going to help us through this difficult time? And Malachi is a prophetic book. It's the last book of our Old Testament, right? And it's full of questions. Questions. Malachi has 55 verses. It has 22 questions in it. It's the book of questions. It's the original FAQ, right? It's the original frequently asked questions in the Bible. And not all of them are the same kind of questions. Some of these questions are posed by God. Some of them are rhetorical questions that Malachi poses and then answers, which the apostle Paul often does. The Amends Bible study is reading through Romans right now. Paul asks, all these rhetorical questions like, well, should we go on sinning more so grace shall abound even more? And then he answers it, by no means. We have these rhetorical questions in scripture. And some of these are questions posed by the people. Where is God? What is he up to? We don't think God is on the level. We have some problems with God. We have some issues with God. And we're asking questions about God and Malachi will answer. So we have six verses this morning. And true to form,

[4:45] there's three questions in these six verses. There they are. So as we read, I want you to listen for the questions and make a mental note of the questions. And we're going to kind of deal with each one of the questions in the context of the challenges facing this community. All right? So let's go to our readings. Malachi, we'll start in chapter two, verse 17, and we'll finish with the fifth verse of chapter three. Malachi writes this, you have wearied the Lord, with your words. Yet you say, how have we wearied him? By saying, all who do evil are good in the sight of the Lord, and he delights in them. Or by asking, where is the God of justice?

[5:32] Chapter three. See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming? And who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner's fire and like fuller's soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendants of Levi and refine them like gold and silver until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old, as in former years.

[6:21] Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be swift to bear witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired workers and their wages, the widow and the orphan, against those who thrust aside the alien. And do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts. Let's pray.

[6:46] Heavenly Father, thank you for this word, and we ask that you would add your blessing to it, in Jesus' name, amen. So did you find the questions? Three questions? They're all in there. Just look for the question marks. I mean, you could do that. It's pretty easy.

[7:01] The first question, and let's have, Andres, I'll have you ask, bring up the first one. Yeah, it's a little hard to see, but at home, you probably have a better chance if you're looking right at it. The first question is a response to God's complaint that he had been worn out, by the people's words, basically. And this isn't new. God sometimes gets worn out by what his people say. He kind of reminds me of a parent that way. Like, you know, do you parents ever get worn out? Not by like, you know, you could take a five mile hike and you think that would wear you out, but actually that leaves me feeling refreshed. But five minutes listening to my children can wear me out like a 25 mile hike. I mean, and I hate to say that, so please forgive me. I'm not the ideal father, all right? But this is God's complaint. You guys are wearing me out with your words. And God says this about the people of Israel in Exodus. If you read Exodus, he's like, I am tired of these people. I wanna start over with you, Moses. And Moses is like, don't do that, don't do that. So God has been wearied out. And this is interesting because we like to think of God as one who can always endlessly take that from us. And he can, you know, God is omnipotent.

[8:11] And so this might be a bit figurative in a way that God is saying, you know, I'm getting tired in a holy way of all the things that you're saying because I think something needs to happen. I think something needs to change. And since I'm perfect, the thing that needs to change is you, not me. This is God's point of view.

[8:32] So the priestly class, these are those who are in the tribe and tradition of Levi. And you maybe remember from the Old Testament, but if you don't know, I'm gonna tell you that Jacob had all these sons and one of them's name was Levi. All of the sons were given, all of their sons, eventually their tribes were given some land when the land was given to the people of Israel, all except Levi. Levi was not given any land at all, the tribe. Instead, Levi was supposed to live among all the tribes and serve as the priestly class, the pastors and the spiritual counselors and sort of just to help the people. And so they were to be, they were, I feel like I'm gonna catch on fire here, but I'm gonna, sorry. Sorry, that's all right. So the Levites or the sons of Levi, the children of Levi, they were supposed to be taken care of by the other tribes. So these were the priest, this was the priestly class, right?

[9:29] And they were the ones who were trying to make everything work here in this new situation that they found themselves in. They were trying to help people worship God, but they were getting evidently a little frustrated with the whole setup, right? Maybe some of them came back from Babylon, and they were like, why doesn't everybody kind of worship the way we expect them to? What's going on? And they're bringing their complaint to God. Some of the context of Malachi.

[9:56] And God is accusing them of losing sight of their calling. He says, how, and so he says, how have we wearied you, God? That's the second question, right? And so God, a lot of Malachi is God sort of having a bit of a, a beef or a bit of a problem with the priestly class.

[10:19] These are the, these are supposed to be the spiritual leaders of the people. These are the pastors. And this hearkens back to last week. If you heard the sermon last week, I kind of complained about some really bad pastors in the world and that the pastors need to be reformed, especially in this country. And I definitely want that for myself. So I'm not saying I've figured it all out, but I see a huge problem with the pastors in our country who have, they've evaluated, they valued, they valued attendance and income and their own sense of peace. They want to hide in their study and not have any conflict that they have to deal with. And they haven't taught people. They haven't discipled people. And, and now in some churches it's too late. And I'm going to be quite honest with you. I just read an article about this.

[11:00] Churches are being split apart because a pretty sizable portion of some of these churches completely believe conspiracy theories. They just believe them and they're not logical. They're ridiculous. You know, or they're, they're kind of being torn aside by those parts of those churches that think that they need to be nationalistic in a Christian way. And both of those are false idols. I mean, we've said this over and over again. I hope it's not a surprise to you. Those are false idols that are besetting the American church. There's no biblical basis for them at all. They can be shown to be anti-biblical ideas in just minutes. Really would not take long at all. But these pastors, they haven't laid that foundation that to be great in the kingdom means to be a servant to the rest. That doesn't sound like Christian nationalism, is it? Or not to bear false witness against your neighbor. And so then you couldn't believe in, believe in or spread conspiracy theories. Or that you have to lay down your life for another. And that there's one kingdom, there's one kingdom that always deserves more allegiance than any other country. Do you see the distinction, right? And I'm, I'm going to pat myself on the back a little bit

[12:12] because long, long ago, there was a time when the church was a church. Long ago, I've been telling you that there's no American section of heaven. Have I told you that there's no section of heaven that's just for Americans? Like when you get to heaven, that none of that is going to matter. And if that's the kingdom there, that's the kingdom. Now you may be Americans. I'm American. You may be from some other country. That's great. That's important. You should go vote and you should do all those things. You should definitely pay your taxes, all those things. But your citizenship is in the kingdom of God first. It's a failure of discipleship for all these pastors who have a problem. They haven't been able to hold that at bay. It's a problem. So the pastors, the priests are at fault. And God is telling the sons of Levi, you pastors, you're responsible. You are the ones that are making trouble. So we need to refine and purify you. So we have the weariness of God. And that leads to another question. The main one for us, they say, how have we, how have we wearied God? And that's in verse 17. And, and so. You know, then God's like, okay, since you asked, you know, I'm going to tell you how you have wearied me. I'm going to tell you all the things that you're saying that are annoying me.

[13:25] It's kind of like a child, like I didn't do that. How did I do that? Yeah. I get that sometimes. Like I tell my child, oh, you did this thing. I didn't do that. Or how did I do that? Like, there's a little bit of a lawyerly thing going on in there. And like, you're smart. You're going to be a lawyer someday. But until then, you know, the family has to operate, you know. But here's how God says, you make statements like this. One of the statements is all who do evil are good in the sight of the Lord and he delights in them. That's in your text right there. This is what the people were saying about God. All, get this, all who do evil are good in the sight of the Lord. In other words, God can't tell the difference between good or evil, or God is blessing the evil people and he delights in them. And that's fight, those are fighting words. They're accusing God of turning a blind eye to evil or even rewarding evil. If you look at Isaiah chapter five, verse 20, it says this, woe to those who call evil good and good evil. God is mad about that. He doesn't like being told that he can't tell the difference between good and evil. And you know what I think in this, all throughout the Bible, there is an actual legitimate lament

[14:37] about this. And it kind of sounds like this. And I think this is where it's coming from. Even from these priestly class people is that God is not going to, God is, he's not going to send a woe or a punishment on them for saying this, but there's this lament that says, where is the God of justice when we see so much injustice? We see people who are evil and they prosper from their evil. And we see this today. So you see sort of the rich get richer, the poor get poorer. Right? Back in Malachi's time, they would say, all these evil people who are doing these bad things that we saw in verse five, their wealth is growing. And because of their evil, they're getting more power, more wealth. And that looks like a blessing from God. And so the lament is real. Why do the wicked prosper? That's a kind of a recurring theme in scripture. But they're saying, but what they're saying is that must be because God thinks evil is good and good is evil. And he doesn't care. Right? So it's an understandable critique of God, but it's missing something important about God and it's missing something important about us. So God does give the answer to that question. The answer is that God will address the problem.

[15:57] Pardon me. God will address the problem that it seems like evil people are being blessed, but he's not going to do it right away. He's going to do it in time. God, God is like that. He's like, I will get to that. I'm going to do it on my list in due time. I'm going to do some things first. I'm going to send my messenger. I'm going to come to the temple. I'm going to judge. It's not going to happen right away.

[16:22] And in time, all things will be set right. Then this is our anticipation in Advent too, is that we're in a period of waiting. We're in a period of anticipation, preparation that the messenger will come, prepare the way for God's arrival in glory and justice.

[16:40] So God says, I will come to the temple. My messenger will come before me. You're waiting for him. You're hoping for him. I get that you're mad that evil looks like it's being, looks like it's being rewarded, but it won't be forever.

[16:56] So then we come to the question is who's the messenger. He says, who is this? Who's this messenger? The messenger will come and, and Malachi leaves it open. It could be, it actually could be in, if you just read Malachi by itself, it could be the Malachi. Malachi might be this messenger or it could be Elijah. The very last verse of Malachi and thus the very last verse of the Old Testament is that the prophet Elijah will come back someday. Maybe it's Elijah. But as we understand it as Christians, the New Testament enlists this passage and the one from Isaiah and points it at John the Baptist. So we understand this to be John the Baptist. Doesn't it's possible that this could be multiple people, you know, that just happens over time and over history. That people are always coming as messengers to prepare the way for the gospel, to prepare the way for God. For us, I think it really does make a lot of sense that it would be John the Baptist. He prepares the way for Jesus. He cleanses and purifies people in the water of baptism and the Jordan river.

[17:55] So and, and, and Jesus himself kind of fits the bill too, although he's the one that the way is being prepared for because he comes and he purifies the temple from all the unsightly commerce that has grown up around it. But Jesus is always confronting the children of Levi, the priestly class. Jesus is always going after them saying, you, you need to love and teach these people, but you're standing in their way.

[18:20] So Jesus has strong words for the Levites, the priestly class. So we do have an answer though. This is, this is the answer from God. He says, you care that the world is unjust. Yeah. It's almost like think of Malachi as a dialogue between God and his people. He says, you care that the world is unjust. Well, I don't care. I'm sending somebody to deal with it, but be careful what you ask for. Be, always be careful for what you ask for from God, because the first step is not dealing with the evil of those people. The first step is to deal with the evil of you people, says Malachi, says God. That when you ask God to smite your enemies, he'll probably get you first. Just be careful. Like just watch out, right?

[19:07] It's not dealing with the evil of those people. It's dealing with the people, the evil, the evil of you people. Evil and people almost rhyme. I just realized that. So that's one of the, that's also one of the answers to why do the evil prosper? Because you let them. Because you're part of the problem. Because you do it too. This is what Malachi says to them. Make sure that you purify yourself first before you ask questions about evil like that. So if you look at verse five, and I'll ask Andres to pop that one up there.

[19:39] He says, you are the ones that are acting unjustly. You are the sorcerers. This is heavy. You're the adulterers. You swear falsely. You oppress the hired workers and the widow and the orphan, and you thrust aside the alien. You don't, you don't treat with hospitality those who are strangers in the land. This is huge, huge problems. And so yes, he's going to purify, but he's going to start with you. He's going to start with the sons of Levi. He's going to start with the priests. He's going to start with the pastors. May it be so in the church. Amen. Right? But they start with the pastors.

[20:14] If God is going to save the church, he has to start with our pastors. So I want you to pray for your pastors. You've got two pastors here, but pray for all the other pastors in our, in our town, in our county, in our country. The church in America is a, is a, is a hot mess right now. It's a dumpster fire. I hate to say it. It's terrible. It's a real mess. A lot of things are going to sift out in the next few weeks. It's a mess. It's a mess. Pray for pastors. We need it. They're, they're leaving the ministry at a really high rate. Okay.

[20:43] Um, many of them are failing to be shepherds and teachers. And some of them think, some of them think they're rock stars. They're going to come to earth. Um, some of them need to do something else. Some of them actually should leave the ministry because they weren't suited for it in the first place. Right?

[20:57] Um, but others, and I'll put me in this group, unless you think I need to leave the ministry, I'll accept that criticism. But. The rest of the pastors need to be refined, refined, purified. He will refine and purify the sons of Levi. That's the image that we want to leave with. And this is kind of the end here. That, that it says he is like a refiner's fire. When you go home today, try to find Handel's Messiah and find this one set to music. He shall pure, it's called, he shall purify the sons of Levi. And he is like a refiner's fire. And who shall stand when he appeareth so that it's kind of in the old Kings James. He is like a refiner's fire. And what is a refiner, right? This is somebody like a silversmith that takes sort of the raw materials that have silver in them, like silver ore. And this is 2600 years ago, but it's amazing how much they knew about metallurgy back then. They had this ore. It was a mixture of rock and silver. And they learned that if they fired it hot enough, this is a really hot. If you fire it hot enough, the impurities would separate out and they would sort of burn away. And then the final moment, this heated mixture will, when it gets hot enough, will shoot out a huge amount of oxygen.

[22:16] This oxidizing, you know how oxygen kind of makes everything tarnished? Well, it'll shoot out oxygen at the end. I don't think they knew the word oxygen, but they knew what, they knew what to wait for. They waited for this moment when it all came flying out of there, the oxygen. And then they would, I knew that was going to happen. Then they would cover it. With charcoal. And that would prevent the oxygen from reentering the mixture when it cooled and it would stay shiny and it would stay bright. And the refiner knew that he was done, he or she, there probably weren't that many, but we'll just say he or she. The refiner knew that he or she was done when they could see their own image in the silver, in the clear, smooth surface of the silver that had cooled. They could see their own image reflected in the precious metal.

[23:06] And is that an image for God? He doesn't want to destroy the sons of Levi. He wants to purify them. He wants to take everything in them that reflects his image and keep it and make it better. And he wants to burn away everything else that does not belong to him and does not come from him. And if I were to ask God for a very dangerous prayer, I would ask him to do that for me. And I'm honestly too frightened to do it just now, maybe later this week, but we should all do this. Can God burn away in us what doesn't belong so that only his image remains so that when he sees us and other people see us, this is the important thing, when other people see us, they see the image of God, not Christian nationalism or white supremacy or all the other crazy things that the church is. Is.

[24:05] Is. Is. Is. Is. ! and the answer is we can but only by the grace of God we can only bring our brokenness to him and we lay it down and we let it be purified and there's maybe just a little bit left but that's enough for God to work with and you will stand even at the last with just that small amount but don't just wait to the end right don't just wait until it's too late do it now give that part of you to God now ask him to get the rest out of the way so that the rest of your life on earth now can be lived in this refined and purified way this is what you ought to be doing this week I'm going to ask you to do it pray for this use advent almost like it's lent use it as a time of preparation and self-reflection it's not about Christmas it's about preparing for the coming of God it's about preparing our hearts being purified and refined like silver so that God's image shines out through from us not all the other stuff God loves you so much he doesn't want to abandon you he wants to purify you he wants to refine you he wants other people to see him in you because he loves you let's pray father thank you again for this powerful reading from Malachi from these questions that get asked the answers that are given father refine your church refine the church and refine the church

[26:00] refine the pastors of the churches in this country and in this world refine each of us as we come to you with what little we have and ask that you burn away everything that doesn't belong and we ask that in Jesus name amen