Malachi 1

Sermon 1 of Malachi by Charles Simeon Sermon 1 The sovereignty of God's grace.

Malachi 1, verses 2 and 3.

I have loved you, saith the Lord.

Yet ye say, wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother, saith the Lord? Yet I love Jacob, and I hated Esau.

from Hori Homiletiki by Charles Simeon.

This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.

Relative Duties to God and Man Malachi 1 verse 6 A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master.

If then I be a father, where is mine honour? And if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the Lord of hosts.

And these words remind us that God keeps his promises in history, that God answers his people's cries in history, that God completes his story in history, in time, in space.

Well, who in the world is this Herod guy? And you may be wondering why I read Malachi 1, why we read that this morning.

Anyone think about that? Okay, we have one gentleman here.

This is good.

Today's Bible teacher is Chuck Missler, connecting the Bible to your life and the world around you.

In today's study, Chuck begins his teaching on the book of Malachi, chapter 1.

We did a survey of Malachi over a year ago, but I think it's a book that warrants us going into a little more depth, so we're going to jump in to the book of Malachi, the Italian book of the Old Testament.

And, of course, I'm kidding.

is generally regarded by most people familiar with the Bible as the end of the Old Testament.

That's actually not quite right.

We're going to discover some things that the Old Testament didn't really end with Malachi, but I'll leave that for another session.

But Malachi is a very short little book, but very rich in the issues that it deals with.

Uh, today's episode assumes, uh, some of the things that we discussed in the last episode, so you'll wanna check that out.

In this episode, we're looking at a very strange passage, verses two through five.

It's in this passage where we encounter a very strange text where God says, "Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated." All right, so what exactly is going on here with this language of divine hatred? Does God actually hate Esau? And should we read into this passage the idea of eternal reprobation with respect to salvation, the salvation specifically of this individual, Esau? Well, we're gonna be looking at all of those questions and more, and I'm eager to get into this text because quite frankly, this- how we interpret this Bible passage has a lot of not only theological implications, but pastoral ramifications and pastoral consequences.

If we don't get this text right, I fear that we could do a lot of damage and cause a lot of fear in people, and so we wanna make sure that we interpret this text fairly and accurately.

Before we do, I want to say a word of thanks to our Patreon supporters.

All right, well, yeah, I say we just jump in.

There's, there's a lot here.

This passage is very strange because of a, of a, of that, uh, verse where it talks about God hating Esau.

It will continue in a different manner.

In fact, we're told in Malachi 1:11, "From the rising of the sun to its setting, in every place incense is offered to my name and a pure offering." Now, as you know very well, Edgar, certain things did change.

That cannot be talking about the Old Covenant sacrifices, because those were restricted to Jerusalem, and Malachi is rebuking the Levitical priests because of their defective sacrifices.

So he's talking about a future coming age where there will be one pure sacrifice offered among the Gentiles in every place.

I daresay that fits the New Covenant Eucharist perfectly.

That is why as early as the ADs, 80 AD, in the first century, the early Christians were already interpreting Malachi 1:11 to be referring to the Holy Eucharist.

And if people, when you read that verse, if you go to mass every Sunday, you recognize those words.

How can, how can you not?

What is a tithe? If you're new to this, 10% of your income.

Before or after tax? Do you want him to help you with your tax bill? Malachi 1 and verse 8 speaks about bringing God, don't bring God blind, lame, and sick offerings because that's evil.

So we don't bring him animals, but in a sense that would be our leftovers, our dregs.

after we've paid all the bills, hear the pennies dropping, as the old religious song goes.