August 13: A MESSAGE OF PREPARATION
“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD. And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.” Malachi 4:5-6
As the last book of the Scriptures before the first coming of the Messiah, Malachi’s book was the “Revelation” of that period. Malachi was a contemporary of Nehemiah, and his message of judgement is directed toward a nation plagued with corrupt priests, practices mixed with paganism, and a presumptuous sense of spiritual security in Israel’s privileged relationship with God. His people had acquired such hardened hearts through their sinful practices that the words of Scripture had no impact.
The name Malachi is an abbreviated form of the Hebrew words for “Messenger of Yahweh.” God’s people were still looking for the arrival of their promised Messiah. They surely had many questions regarding their perceived delay of His arrival . . . But, through His prophet Malachi, the LORD posed some questions for them (and us), to cause ponderance of the irresponsibility with which the truths of God have been handled – and the deep corruption that has resulted. Among the subjects addressed are arrogance, false worship, hypocrisy, marriages with unbelievers, divorce, and all manner of infidelity to the principles of holy living.
The Elijah message is one of preparation. His appearance was sudden and unannounced: And Elijah the Tishbite, of the inhabitants of Gilead, said to Ahab [king of Israel], “As the LORD God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, except at my word.” (1 Kings 17:1) In declaring a draught, God was not abandoning His people. Rather, He was emphasizing that they had sufficient knowledge upon which to proceed faithfully through life. The obvious solution in the anticipation of a draught was (and is) to seek and obey the wisdom He has already imparted through His word. Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. (2 Timothy 2:15)
When the word of truth has been wrongly divided, a door to misunderstanding and/or corruption is opened. Our spiritual archenemy, the great deceiver, never misses an opportunity to walk through such an open door and misrepresent the LORD. The final words of Malachi emphasize the mishandling of God’s word, and how divisive it has been within the individual family unit, and also the family of God as a whole. The mention of Elijah’s name carries with it the possibility of draught. Indeed, there was a “famine” of the word of God lasting 400 years after these verses were written. The Elijah ‘message of preparation’ has an application to every generation. Preparation to meet the LORD is at the core. In Elijah’s day, there was a standoff in the nation of Israel between the remnant of true worshipers of God and the growing majority of those involved in false worship. In Malachi’s day, the flagrant apostasy of God’s professed people was so profound that God’s 400 years of silence (no prophets among the people) that followed was an act of mercy; and every soul who sought wholeheartedly found Him.
But from there you will seek the LORD your God, ad you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul. Deuteronomy 4:29 (see also Jeremiah 29:13)