Mal 2:17-3:4, 8-12
30 August 2009
“Don’t Kill the Messenger”
When I started this little series on the Minor Prophets, I promised that each one would be very different from the others. What’s different about Malachi isn’t so much his message—although at his point in history, he puts a new spin on things. No, more than his message, it’s his style that sets him apart.
Instead of the usual, “thus says the Lord,” Malachi uses a question-and-answer format. Some say the book is meant to portray a court case, with the Jewish nation bringing charges against God, charges which in turn are rebutted.
Now briefly, about that historical context I mentioned: the book of Malachi is set in the mid 5th century B. C., almost 100 years after the first exiles returned from Babylonia. This is well into the era of Persian rule.
By this time, the temple has been rebuilt, but the people have grown weary of their new masters. Still, just as the handwriting on the wall spelled doom for the Babylonian Empire, the Persian Empire will begin to weaken until, in the next century, a guy named Alexander the Great will lead the Greeks throughout the Middle East.
Besides his question-and-answer style, there’s something else that sets Malachi apart. It’s the very real possibility that the prophet we call Malachi is actually anonymous. We may not know who he is.
The Hebrew word “Malachi,” ykia;l]m' (male’aki), literally means, “my messenger.” It’s often assumed that the name comes from 3:1. “I will send my messenger [I will send Malachi] to prepare the way for me” (GNB). Still, for the sake of convenience, I’ll just call him Malachi.
If we know what the name Malachi means, maybe my sermon title makes sense. As with other prophets, Malachi’s message is likely to get a chilly response from his audience. He repeatedly mentions the covenant of love that God has established with them, as well as the ways they’ve violated it.
Here’s where understanding the history helps. As I said, at this point, the Persians have been in charge for a long time. It’s the frequent scenario of the liberator becoming the oppressor. Malachi addresses a defeated people. They’re dispirited; their faith has been deflated. Already, in the second verse of the book, we see that they wonder if God really loves them.
As our reading today begins, we hear the cry, “Where is the God who is supposed to be just?” or “Where is the God of justice?” (2:17, GNB, NRSV). In the face of Persian rule, many doubt that the Lord even cares about what’s going on.
If you remember what I said last week about Zephaniah, here’s where we get something that should be familiar. Malachi speaks of the coming day of judgment, the day of the Lord. The church sees the two figures, “my messenger to prepare the way for me” and “the Lord you are looking for,” as John the Baptist and Jesus Christ (3:1).
He gets on their cases about several things, but verse 8 has an interesting question. “I ask you,” says the prophet, “is it right for a person to cheat God?” The NRSV puts it, “Will anyone rob God?” Malachi gets into the always lively subject of money and possessions.
Actually, he’s already brought it up. In chapter 1, he chastises the people for bringing lame and diseased animals to the temple for sacrifice. Malachi makes this inquiry, dripping with sarcasm, “Do you think the government would let you get away with that? So why are you trying it with God?”
I sometimes notice this with gifts to charities and church groups. This past week, I went to the Salvation Army in Bath with some boxes of donations. As I drove up to the loading dock, I saw a woman dumping armloads of clothes onto the concrete, right next to the edge of the dock. I can’t say that the clothes were soiled, but she didn’t appear to be treating them as an offering to the church.
The prophet continues his line of thought in chapter 3. By being stingy with their tithes and offerings, the people are robbing God. Malachi has mentioned other ways in which their worship has become slipshod. The withholding of offerings is yet one more example of how their worship is insincere.
But of course, this is much bigger than what happens on Sunday morning. This extends to all of life. We hear the promise of the Lord, when “put…to the test,” to “see if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing” (v. 10).
I don’t know about you, but this is a scripture text I’ve heard abused in some pretty crass ways. I’ve heard preachers talk about giving to God like it’s a business transaction. The promises of God’s blessings are compared with wise investments. It seems to me that we only dimly appreciate and understand the blessing of God. How often do we even seek to understand?
Verse 11 continues the pledge: “I will rebuke the locust for you, so that it will not destroy the produce of your soil” (NRSV). The Hebrew word for “locust” (lkeao,’okel) literally means “devourer.” Today, locusts are still a problem, but we all can think of things that eat up our resources.
Malachi wants the people to reaffirm the covenant with Yahweh that they’ve disregarded. A big part of that is getting their priorities in order. When that happens, the word from the Lord is that “all nations will count you happy, for you will be a land of delight” (v. 12). The Lord will bless them, or more precisely, they’ll understand that they’ve already been blessed.
The tithe, ten percent, was part of the Old Testament law. It was part of the teaching Jesus received. Many of his parables deal with the use of money and valuables. In fact, much of Jesus’ own teaching deals with wealth. Unfortunately, money tends to bring out the worst in us. Maybe that’s why our Lord so often warns about its power.
The “true story [is told] of a man in Dade County, Florida, who sued his church for the return of the money which he had contributed to it. ‘I delivered $800 of my savings to the…Church,’ said the man in the [lawsuit], ‘in response to the pastor’s promise that blessings, benefits, and rewards would come to the person who did tithe 10 per cent of his wealth. I did not and have not received these benefits.’”[1]
This guy, his pastor, or both of them are looking at this thing completely backward. They’re asking, “What’s in it for me?” And by the way, there’s some of that crassness I spoke of earlier!
Our litigious church member, as well as his pastor, might do well to meditate on 2 Corinthians 9. They need to be reminded that “God loves a cheerful giver,” one whose vision is expanded to see the big picture (v. 7). When such a person gives, the result is an overflow “with many thanksgivings to God” (v. 12).
What we’re talking about here is
stewardship. And stewardship is about
more than just money. Again, this
extends to all of life. It even includes
home sweet home.
Marilyn Gardner wrote an article for the Christian Science
Monitor entitled, “What’s Happening to the American Home?”[2] One of the article’s main points was that the
size of new houses in the US has been growing by 500 square feet every 20 years
since 1950, while family size has decreased from 3.4 to 2.6. The reason for the increased size is partly,
if not primarily, due to our consumer culture’s thirst for more and more
possessions.
It’s long seemed to me that referring to people as
“consumers” is actually an insult; it’s a disparaging command. Especially in America, whether in the church
or out of it (sadly, it doesn’t seem to make any difference!), we are given an
order to consume. Take the earth’s
resources, turn them into all kinds of useless crap, buy them, eat them, put
them in off-site storage units, use cheaply-made products which soon break,
throw them away, and then consume more in a ridiculous cycle.
Cindy Glovinsky, author of Making Peace
With the Things in Your Life, says, “If there’s one addiction that’s
holding the human race hostage, it’s an addiction to things…I’ve seen people who
haven’t had a guest in their home for years because they’re having so much
trouble keeping up with stuff, and they’re so ashamed of the way things
look…Yet these people refuse to let go of things so they can have people in
their lives.” Architect Sarah Susanka is
even more blunt: “We’re not living our
lives…Our stuff is living us.”
The crazy thing—the insane thing—is that this addiction to
consume is one we willfully plunge into.
But God, always faithful, constantly calls us to turn from this false god
that consumes us, this ’okel
that devours! It leads us to disproportionately devote our
resources and energy. We forget that
everything we own is a gift from God—and should be treated as such.
Joan Chittister tells a story about the rabbi of Sassov (in
present-day Ukraine).[3] Apparently, he “once gave away the last money
he had in his pocket to a man of ill repute who quickly squandered it all. The
rabbi’s disciples threw it up to him. He
answered them: ‘Shall I be more finicky
than God, who gave it to me?’”
If you’re like me, when I first heard
that, there was a red flag that went up.
Should we simply waste our
resources? That would seem to contradict
what I said earlier. Still, I wonder if,
when opportunities for ministry and sharing present themselves, do we often
first look for reasons not to do
something? (I’m not sure; it’s something
to think about.)
In
our heart of hearts, we want to be free—free of the many things that would
enslave us. I can’t pretend to have the
answer that each of us needs for liberation.
In this sermon, I’ve made the tiniest hints at what such a life would
look like. Instead, I invite us to
journey together with the true messenger from God and ask him to refine us, to
purify us, so that we may shine brighter than gold.