You'd open your Bibles to the book of Malachi. Malachi chapter one. I'm going to be reading verse six. Malachi one verse six. A son honors his father and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? Says the Lord of hosts. Let's pray. Oh, great God and Father, we bow before you this night. You are great, oh God, and truly your greatness is unsearchable. And we confess this night that we know so little of you that we see but through a glass dimly We pray, O God, that you would open our minds and our hearts, the very eyes of our souls, to behold your glory as it is set forth in your word, that we might grow in fear and reverence towards you. Father, we confess as a people that we are so prone to the decline, the declension of this fear of God. We pray that this night you would revive it in us, that you would grow us to fear you, that you would grow us to love you and serve you with all that we are. Please bless the word as it is preached tonight to our hearing and help us to receive it in faith and in meekness onto the salvation of our souls. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Providentially, because of my coursework, I've been able to spend the last couple of weeks studying the minor prophets and My soul has been so stirred and challenged by my study and especially by the book of Malachi that I felt compelled to preach from this book tonight. And so we're going to take a break this month from the book of Galatians and be examining this amazing prophecy, this final prophecy that God gave to the nation of Israel. Malachi was the final prophet of God upon the scene of the Old Testament. Prior to this, God had dealt graciously with his people in many different ways. He had delivered them from their bondage in Egypt, He had brought them into the wilderness, covenanted with his people graciously there at Sinai, and then fulfilled his covenant promises, bringing his people under Joshua into the promised land. His covenant with them under Moses entailed both blessings and curses. God promised that if Israel obeyed the covenant stipulations, then he would shower innumerable blessings upon them in the land of promise, that he would prosper them there. But if Israel failed to render the obedience which God required, walking in unbelief, idolatry, and immorality, then they would become objects of God's covenant curse, and eventually that curse would culminate in their exile from the land. God had made this abundantly clear to his people. And though God exercised great patience with his unbelieving people for many centuries in the promised land, eventually their continued unbelief and apostasy led to their exile from the promised land. So God delivered them out of Egypt, through the wilderness, into the promised land, He said, if you obey me, if you worship me as I have commanded you to do, I will bless you and prosper you in this land. If you fail to do so, I will curse you and you will be driven out of this land and scattered among the nations. And they disobeyed God and continued in a state of unbelief and thus God in fulfillment to his covenant. drove them out of the land of promise, and they were exiled. He first drove out the northern kingdom of Israel by the hand of the Assyrians, and then drove out the southern kingdom of Judah by the hand of the Babylonians. But what is absolutely astounding is not that Israel was exiled. but that the history of Israel did not end in exile. God in his loving kindness and covenant faithfulness promised to bring a remnant of his people back into the land if they would obey and keep covenant with him. And this he did, beginning with the decree of Cyrus to rebuild the temple under Zerubbabel, followed by the revival and reformation under Ezra, and then culminating in the rebuilding of the city of Jerusalem under Nehemiah. And so God brings a small remnant from Judah back into the Promised Land. The temple is rebuilt under Zerubbabel, and under Ezra, and then the walls of Jerusalem and the city is rebuilt under Nehemiah. And it is in the days of Nehemiah that Malachi exercised his ministry as a prophet of God, as the final prophet of God. He was the final post-exilic prophet. Zechariah, Haggai, and Malachi are the three post-exilic prophets. They prophesied after Israel had come back into the land, after the exile. At this point, when Malachi is prophesying, the temple had been rebuilt and its priesthood and sacrifices had been reinstituted for decades. Haggai, who had ministered prior to the completion of this second temple, had prophesied in Haggai 2.9 that the latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former. Zechariah, who ministered alongside of Haggai before this temple was completed, declared the word of the Lord, saying that Jerusalem shall be inhabited as villages without walls because of the multitude of people and livestock in it. and I will be to her a wall of fire all around, declares the Lord, and I will be the glory in her midst. But these promises of the latter day glory of post-exilic Israel had not materialized. Decade after decade had passed. Some scholars say it was about 75 years later that Malachi is on the scene. This latter day glory of the temple and of Jerusalem that Haggai and Zachariah prophesied of had not come about. God's people continued to be a weak minority surrounded by and under the power of strong nations. And the second temple did not even come close to the glory of the first under Solomon. Because of this, the returned exiles over time fell into increasing disillusionment and unbelief, and their religion became increasingly cold, corrupt, and even apostate. God, in his grace, gave a final word to his unbelieving people through Malachi, a redemptive word that would be followed by four hundred years of silence. This was God's last old covenant word. He raised up Malachi to call his people back to a true religion founded upon the fear of him. The book of Malachi is a strong rebuke to a people in gracious covenant with God, who had no fear of God before their eyes. The Lord asked them in verse six, chapter one, where is my fear? Where is my fear? The whole prophecy, all four chapters, 55 verses are an earnest call of God to his people to a revival of the covenantal fear of God. John Murray describes the fear of God as the controlling sense of the majesty and holiness of God and the profound reverence which this apprehension draws forth. In other words, It is a domineering, soul-transforming perception of the beauties and glories of God, producing a sincere, awe-filled reverence and honor toward God that pervades all of life. If you're going to fear God, that entails seeing God in His glory and that sight of His majesty producing in you a reverence that transforms the whole of your life and your being. It was just this fear of the Lord that was absent in the hearts of this Hebrew remnant. And I think it's true to say that it is just this fear of the Lord that is lacking in so much of the church of Jesus Christ today and in our own hearts here this night as we come to worship. We need the same revival of this covenantal fear as Israel did. Even the holiest saint here tonight knows his or her proneness. to the declension of the fear of God in their soul. And thus the summits of God tonight addresses not just post-exile Israel, it addresses us. God speaks to us in his prophetic word. I want to examine this declension of the fear of the Lord as it's set forth by Malachi under three heads tonight. First, its root. Second, its result. And third, its remedy. First, its root. This absence of the fear of God had its root in unbelief. It was the result of the unbelief of God's people that they did not fear him. If a true fear of God entails a perception of God's manifold excellencies producing a deep-seated reverence toward God, then a lack of the fear of God entails the failure to rightly perceive God in His glory, to rightly see Him as He is, producing a contemptible lack of care for God. Israel, seeing the disconnect between their present state and the prophecy of post-exilic Israel's glory, began to question God. They began to doubt his character. They began to doubt his faithfulness to the covenants. Malachi's prophecy is structured around six disputations, six arguments between God and his people. God makes a statement of fact in these disputations. The people object to this statement of fact, either making a statement or posing a question. And then God responds to their objection and defends and proves that which he has said. The very fact that Israel was questioning and challenging God in this way is manifold evidence of their wicked, unbelieving hearts. Malachi begins his prophecy with this amazing statement. This most stern, rather hard prophecy begins verse two with God saying this, I have loved you. I have loved you, says the Lord. But you say, how have you loved us? God begins this rather stern prophecy with a declaration of his covenant love toward Israel. But Israel, examining their lowly, far from glorious state, questions this love. Does God really love us? If God really loved us, he would have prospered us in the land as he promised. They looked at their present circumstances and doubted God's eternal electing covenant love for them. One commentator commenting on this question of God's love says this, essentially the question boiled down to this, Lord, what have you done for us lately? Life as a vassal state under Persia was hard for those who had returned from exile. Their situation seemed far from the golden age of peace and prosperity anticipated in Isaiah 40 through 66, or even in the book of Haggai. In the midst of a generally disappointing and frustrating experience of life, they questioned God's interest in their plight, and thus his commitment to fulfill his covenant promises. They questioned whether God really loved them and whether he would really be faithful to his covenant. We see this unbelief of the people again in the fourth argument, the fourth disputation in chapter two, verse 17. You have wearied the Lord with your words and Israel responds, but you say, How have we wearied him? By saying, everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delights in them. Or by asking, where is the God of justice? Their circumstances, coupled with the prosperity of the godless nations around them, led them to question the justice of God. They doubted his holy, righteous character, concluding that he must delight in sin and wickedness since these nations around them were prospering. Israel in the days of Malachi had a woefully wrong view of God. They had denied his love, his justice, his goodness, his covenant faithfulness, and they had allowed their circumstances, which were really the result of their own sin, to keep them from that controlling sense of the majesty and holiness of God. which Mr. Murray taught us about. And this was the root and source of their declension in the fear of God. They knew not God in truth and thus did not fear God. And friends, it's easy for us to fall into this same pernicious air, to derive our doctrine of God from an unbelieving examination of our experience rather than a believing appropriation of God's Word. We can look at our experience and begin to question God, to begin to question God's love, His justice, His faithfulness, His goodness, rather than coming to His word humbly and believingly, regardless of what our circumstances look like. Saying, God, this is who you have revealed yourself to be, and I believe you are who you say you are. We're really No different than Israel here. We can be so quick to question God's love when hardship comes. We can doubt the justice of God when we see the weakness of his people and the power and prosperity of the wicked. If we live by sight rather than by faith in this wicked, evil age, we will embrace the same damnable view of God that Israel had in the days of Malachi. And to the extent that this is so, we will be void of the fear of God. When you begin to question God with an unbelieving heart, these weren't innocent questions. They were saying that God was delighting in evil. Where's the God of justice? Look at all these wicked nations prospering. God must be delighting in them, and He must hate us because we're not prospering. Where's the God of love? Where's the God that promised all of this glory to Israel? He must not care. He must not be a covenant-keeping God. They were reasoning from an unbelieving, wicked heart, and thus were void of fear of God. So much so that God comes to them through the prophet Malachi and asks, where, where is my fear? Where are the God fears among my people? The fear of God is founded upon a believing sight and appropriation of the glory of God, and God's people had rejected him and his glory, and were rather focusing upon their present experience and plight. So we see the root of this fear of God is an unbelief in God's character, in God's nature, a failure to reckon with who God is, to see him in his glory, to not just know rightly doctrinally about who he is, but to know in our living experience who he is, to rightly know and perceive him and to be taken up with all that he is. Second, notice the results of this declension in the fear of God. This declension which was rooted in Israel's unbelief has two primary results. And the book of Malachi focuses mostly upon the first and less upon the second. But these two results are first, loveless worship, and second, lawless living. First, loveless worship. A lack of the fear of God leads to dead formality and heartless drudgery in the worship of God. Where there is no true fear of God, there will be no true worship of God, despite the outward appearance of such. It was the wickedness of the people's worship that led the Lord to ask, where is my fear? It was their worship Turn to Malachi chapter one. I wanna read that passage. Beginning in verse six, a son honors his father and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? Says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests who despise my name. God says, look, it's only natural. for a son to honor his father, and for a servant to fear and honor his master. If I am as a father to you, if I am as a master to you, why do you not honor me? Where is my honor? Where is my fear? You who despise my name. This lack of honor, this lack of fear, and this despising of God's name are all synonymous. They all speak of the same reality. Israel, because of their unbelieving hearts, were failing to honor and fear God. They were despising his name, which means they were despising him. God says, Where is my fear? Oh, you priests who despise my name. But you say, How have we despised your name? Here's God's response. by offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, how have we polluted you? By saying that the Lord's table may be despised. When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor. Will he accept you or show you favor? Says the Lord of hosts. According to verse 14, some were vowing to give God the best of their livestock and then cheating God by sacrificing to Him that which was blemished. They were presenting gifts to God which would have caused them to blush had they given them to an earthly superior, but they feared not the Lord and had no regard for His glory in His worship. One commentator said, the problem was not a flaw in the form of Israel's worship, but rather in its substance. They had a form of true worship. The temple had been reestablished. The priesthood was functioning. Sacrifices were being offered every day. It looked like things were going well. It looked like God was being worshiped. There was a form of worship, but it was lacking the substance of true worship. We can have a form of biblical worship. And as Reformed Christians, we can have a form of biblical worship as we follow ardently the regulative principle of worship, only doing that which God has prescribed in His Word in the public worship. We can be most zealous about that. And yet if the substance of our worship is void of the fear and honor and love of God, it will bring God great displeasure rather than being a sweet-smelling fragrance to his nostrils. Are we offering to God our best? or merely seeking to appease our consciences with our heartless, formal, second-rate offerings which we would not dare to give to an earthly superior? Is our worship of God pervaded with a fear and honor of Him whom we worship? Do we gather as His new covenant temple, as His new covenant priesthood with a profound reverence in our hearts flowing from a sense of His majesty and holiness? Or does God look down and say, where is my fear, you who despise my name? You who have a form of true worship, but lack the substance of God-fearing, biblical, spirit-filled worship. I was convicted by this on Tuesday evening. We were having a sleepover at home and We were running a little bit late and it's kind of a last minute thing. And I had this temptation in my heart to just forego family worship. And I immediately said, no, we're going to do family worship. That's the priority. And I told Cannon, we're going to have family worship before we have our sleepover and watch our movie and have dessert and all this fun stuff. And Cannon asked me why, and I said, because worship of God is the most important thing, buddy. And a couple minutes later, we're still getting stuff ready, and then this more subtle temptation comes. And that is, well, okay, we'll do family worship, but let's make it a quick one, you know, maybe just read a short psalm, say a quick prayer, sing one verse of a hymn, and just be done so we can get on, because it's getting late, and we got lots of fun stuff planned. Don't want the cannon to miss out. And I actually pondered that for some time and considered it and was convicted by the Lord in my mindset towards family worship as if it was just something to do because it was the right thing to do. No, we we just need to do it. It's it's priority. Let's just get it done with so we can get on to what we really want to do. We don't we don't really desire to do this. I don't I don't I'm not really coming with a reverential awe and fear of God seeking to bring my family into the presence of God through the word of God and to plead and pray with my family for his blessing upon us. It was just, let's just get this done as quick as we can so we can have fun. How often is that our mindset when we come to church on Sunday morning or when we do our devotions in the morning? We got our minds on all these other things that we really want to do, but our conscience is bound. It's the right thing to do. We're going to go to church. We're going to worship God. We're going to do all the right things. And even in the worship, we're going to do all the right things. We're going to read the word. The word's going to be preached. We're going to pray. We're going to sing hymns and songs and spiritual songs. And yet there's no substance of true God fearing, believing worship, it's all just dead drudgery and formality, and we think we're honoring God. This is what was happening in the days of Malachi. The maimed offerings of Israel so angered the Lord that he cries in verse 10 of chapter 1, "'Oh, that there were one among you who would shut the doors!' Would someone just come and shut the doors of this temple that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain? "'I have no pleasure in you,' says the Lord of hosts, "'and I will not accept an offering from your hand.'" God so despised this irreverent, loveless, begrudging worship that he wished someone would just shut the temple doors and put the fire forever out upon the altar. This ought to be a most sobering thought for us. How many churches does God look down and say, oh, that someone would just shut the doors and put the fire out? They're despising my name. There is no honor. and fear of God in this place. Would to God that that would not be said of us. But friends, we are not exempt or immune to this declension of the fear of God, which leads to such God-despising worship. We need to be actively seeking to grow in the fear of God. We need to be renewing our minds in the Word, living by faith in God's Word and not by sights, looking at our present experiences. We need to be praying to God that He would take the truths that He has revealed about Himself and so impress them upon our souls, so illumine and open our minds that we would come to an ever-deepening, ever-growing, ever-thriving fear and reverence of Him that we might render Him worship in the church and in our homes and in private that brings glory and honor to him. This is what the prophecy of Malachi is all about. It is about God's worship, and God ought to be feared in his worship. And when we fail to fear him, then we fail to worship him rightly. This declension in the covenantal fear of God led not only to loveless worship, but also to lawless living among God's people. When the people of God lose a sense of the majesty of God, they fail to render to God the glory due his name in their homes and in their lives. Malachi speaks of the breakdown of the home in a most stark way. And he does so all through the lens of this declension of the fear of God. He says in chapter 2, verse 15, that he had brought about marriages among his people for the sake of raising up a godly seed, godly offspring. God was desirous of a righteous, God-fearing heritage. But instead, his people had sought groundless divorce and were seeking intermarriage with the unbelieving nations around them. Chapter two, verse 10 says, have we not all one father? Has not one God created us? Why then are we faithless to one another profaning the covenant of our fathers? Judah has been faithless and abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem for Judah has profaned the sanctuary of the Lord, which he loves and has married the daughter of a foreign God. May the Lord cut off from the tents of Jacob any descendant of the man who does this and who brings an offering to the Lord of hosts. And this second thing you do, you cover the Lord's altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. But you say, why does he not? Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth to whom you have been faithless. Though she is your companion and your wife by covenant, did he not make them one with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking godly offspring? So guard yourselves in your spirit and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth. For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel covers his garment with violence. So we see from this passage and from an examination of Nehemiah chapter 13, which would have been happening right at the same time, that the people were indulging in groundless divorce, no reason, and they were intermarrying with the nations around them, with daughters of a foreign god. This was precisely what God had commanded them not to do. Deuteronomy chapter seven, verse two. You shall make no covenant with them, speaking of the nations in the land of promise, and shall show no mercy to them. You shall not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for they would turn away your sons from following me to serve other gods. So Malachi tells us that God instituted marriage for the purpose of godly offspring. And in Deuteronomy chapter seven, God condemns intermarriage with these godless nations for the same purpose, because God knows if his people are going to intermarry with these other nations, their children are going to be led astray to worship other gods. And God was jealous that his people's children and their children's children and their children's children's children would receive the blessings of his gracious covenant. But God's people had spurned his covenant and sought to satisfy their flesh to the detriment of their homes. In verse 10 of chapter 2, Malachi says that they did this because they were faithless. They were unbelieving. They were not trusting in the Lord and thus not fearing the Lord. Michael Barrett commenting on this passage says this, the breakup of homes is irrefutable evidence that many hearts are not right with the Lord. The home is always the test of how real religion is. Indeed, religion is no more real than it is in the home. Discord in the home is evidence of dead, inactive religion in most cases. In other words, the home is one of the best litmus tests to determine whether you fear the Lord or not. Are you fearing God? Men, let me speak to you, and these are things I've been speaking to myself and asking myself all week as I have been pondering and digesting this message. But as the head of your homes, is your walk as a husband and a father pervaded with the fear of the Lord? Does your relationship with your wife evidence a profound reverence for God in your soul? Are you zealous to raise up a godly seed? And is there anything that would bring you greater pleasure and joy than to see your children walking in the truth? Do you pray, not just once a day, but all throughout the day, pleading with God that he would work in the hearts of your children and speak to your children continuously as you're going about the day, as you're on your way? But the things of God, are you zealous in these things? Are you living for the glory of God in your home? Don't fool yourself into believing that you fear God if you are not diligently, believingly, and prayerfully seeking to love your wife as Christ loves the church and seeking to raise your children in the fear and admonition of the Lord. If there is negligence here in my soul or in any of our souls, it is evidence that there is a severe declension in the fear of God. And it's possible there might not be any fear of God at all. Is it well with our homes? Malachi speaks not only of lawless living as it relates to the home, but also lawless living more in a general sense among God's people. And he speaks of this as flowing from a lack of this fear. In chapter three, verse five, he says this, I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness. He's speaking to his people here about the sins of his people. This is not. foreign nations he's talking to, I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner. And do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts. It is most probable, and a number of commentators point this out, that this last phrase, and do not fear me, serves to summarize the whole list of these detestable sins. Malachi does what the Apostle Paul would later do in the book of Romans in chapter three, after quoting Old Testament verse after Old Testament verse to show every angle of the radical depravity of man ends Verse 18, chapter 3, by quoting Psalm 36, 1, there is no fear of God before their eyes. The lawless living of God's people was an evidence and result of their lack of fearing him. And this was one of the reasons why their worship was an abomination in the sight of God. Not only were they offering up maimed sacrifices, giving God their leftovers, but they were living such wicked lives and then thinking they could just prance into the temple courts, bringing their sacrifices and somehow be pleasing to God in their worship and God would have none of it. Where is my fear? By their worship, By their living, they were evidencing a hatred towards God. They despised his name. Malachi doesn't end there. He doesn't leave his hearers without a remedy. He doesn't merely pronounce woe upon woe, but as a preacher of the veiled gospel of Christ, he pleads with his readers, or rather God pleads through him to look in faith to the Messiah. It is the coming Messiah who alone can remedy this declension of the fear of God. Remember the question that we read in verse 17 of chapter two? God was wearied by their words. They were accusing God of injustice, of loving wickedness. And they were asking this question, where is the God of justice? Where is the God of justice? And God responds. Chapter three, verse one. Behold, you wanna know where the God of justice is? Behold, I send my messenger. And he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will come suddenly to his temple. And the messenger of the covenant in whom you desire, behold, 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 sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver. And they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years. So we see that Malachi prophesies of a messenger who will come before the Lord comes. And after the coming of this messenger, the Lord, who is also called the messenger of the covenant, will come quickly in justice. Where is the God of justice? he will come to his temple swiftly, purifying the hearts and worship of those who have some measure of fear of him and condemning those who fear him not. He will come in judgment. He will come to separate the wheat from the chaff. And he will bring about true God-honoring worship rooted in the fear of God. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord. Jesus quotes this passage in Matthew chapter 11 and says that this messenger who would proceed the coming of the Lord was none other than John the Baptist. If you turn to chapter four of Malachi, he speaks of this coming messenger once again in verse five. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. John the Baptist fulfilled this prophecy, coming in the spirit and power of Elijah, preparing the way of the Lord. He prepared the way of Christ, the messenger of the covenants, who came to his people as a refiner's fire and as fuller's soap. who came in justice and love, seeking to raise up a people who would worship God in spirit and in truth, a people who would offer sacrifices pleasing to the Lord, a people who had not merely a form of true worship, but the substance of true worship, a people who feared God. This day of the Lord, when the Messiah comes brings about both blessings and curses. It brings covenant blessing to those who fear God and covenant curse for those who do not fear God. Turn to verse 16 of chapter three. Then those who feared the Lord spoke with one another. The Lord paid attention and heard them. And a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the Lord and esteemed his name. They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession. And I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him. Then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between the one who serves God and the one who does not serve him. For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. But for you who fear my name, the son of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. God's covenant people were despising his name and failing to fear him and honor him as their father and master. But when the Messiah comes, this will not be so. He will purify Israel and will bring judgment upon their hypocritical worship and ultimately destroy this second temple and end the physical priesthood of Levi because of their hard, obstinate, unbelieving hearts. For those who fail to fear him, there is nothing but curse when this Messiah comes. But Malachi says, for those who fear them, the Lord has a book of remembrance. And in that day, when the Lord comes, Those who are in that book of remembrance will be made his treasured possession. This phrase, treasured possession, hearkens back to Exodus 19, where God says to Israel that they are his treasured possession. It is a beautiful picture. God, through his Messiah, is going to purify Israel and make her a God-fearing people, a new and true Israel, who are as a precious treasure which he owns and loves. This people and their God-fearing worship, according to Malachi, will not merely consist of Jews, but will reach to the ends of the earth and encompass all nations, tribes, and tongues. If you turn quickly to Malachi 1, just after he had said he wished that they would just shut the doors of the temple, God says this, verse 11, For from the rising of the sun to its setting, my name will be great among the nations. And in every place, incense will be offered to me, and a pure offering, for my name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts. Verse 14, for I am a great king, says the Lord of hosts, and my name will be feared among the nations. God so despised what was taking place in that temple. He wished the doors would be shut. And just in case anyone was wondering if God needed their faithless, heartless, loveless worship, He says, my name will be made great, not in some little temple in the promised land filled with unbelieving wicked people, but it will be made great. It will be feared in all the earth. And this is why the messenger of the covenant would come. He'd come. to bring judgment upon Israel for their lack of fear of God, for their loveless worship and lawless living, which resulted from that lack of fear of God. And for those who did fear him, he would make them his treasured possession and then take multitudes from every tribe, nation, and tongue and raise up a true new Israel who feared him and worshiped him rightly. There's much hope in this prophecy. Malachi calls the people to look to the coming Messiah. He called the unbelieving Israelites to look to the Messiah. And God too calls us to look to the Messiah. Whether you be an unbelieving, fearless hater of God, or a Christian who does not fear God as he ought to, which none of us do, The remedy is the same for us all. There is but one, the messenger of the covenant, the one who perfectly feared the Lord. He has come following the proclamation and preparation through the ministry of John the Baptist. He has come as a refiner's fire and as fuller's soap to purify his people, to purge them of their sins, and to make a people who fear the Lord. And He alone can grow us in that fear, and He alone can make us have that fear for the first time. When Malachi prophesied this, he did not have in mind, I presume, that Christ would come and then go away for a time and then come again. Really, in this prophecy, we have prophesied of both the first and the second coming of our Savior, obviously the first, because it speaks so plainly of John the Baptist, who was the forerunner. And we see Christ coming in judgment and justice, judging, unbelieving Israel and inaugurating the kingdom of God and raising up a people who fear him and worship him rightly. But there is also coming a day when he will come in judgment, in a consummate sense. And he will, in a consummate sense, separate the wheat from the chaff, the hypocritical worshipers from the true worshipers. And I think that that is here in this passage. God would have us tonight to think upon that, to think upon the coming judgment, to think upon the God of justice, to examine ourselves in light of these things and ask rather than having the Lord ask us. Is there any fear of God in my soul? Does my life, does my home, does my worship of God, does my work in the workplace, do my interactions with others, do these things evidence that there is at least in some sense a fear of God, a reverence of God, an awe of God, a perception of God's glory and the fact that His eye is upon me and a desire above all else for His smile and a dreading of His frown? Do I have that? Do I know that? Do I desire to please Him? Do I fear God? And if not, there is coming a day when the Son of Righteousness will come in flaming fury. He will come to destroy eternally, all those who fear Him not, all those who offer Him maimed, heartless offerings and fail to truly worship Him. Malachi calls us to repentance. He calls Christians to repentance in that we have not feared God to the extent that we ought to. And he calls non-Christians to repentance in that they have failed to fear God whatsoever. There is no fear of God before their eyes. And he calls us all to look to this one, the messenger of the covenant. the one who has and will, in consummate finality, purify his people and present them as a treasured possession to his father, in which he will delight in for all eternity." That's beautiful, friends. If you're a Christian tonight, you are his treasured possession. And that ought to cause you to desire to cultivate a deeper and more pervasive fear of him. And from that fear to more fully honor him in his worship and in obedience to his commands. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word and for your mercy and patience towards us. Oh God, you are so patient to us. How many times we have worshipped you in an unbelieving manner. How many times we have failed to render you the obedience that you deserve. Father, every moment of our lives we fail to fear, honor, worship, and obey you as we ought. Every moment we break the greatest commands to love you with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves, and yet you continue with us for the sake of Christ. We thank you for our Savior, for the Messiah, for the one who came, for the one who has purified so many of us, has washed us as fuller soap from our filth, and has made us in some sense with our new hearts and renovated souls to fear you. We pray you would increase this fear, O God, that you would not allow us to decline in this fear, but that you would revive it in us. Even this night, O God, even as we would partake of the sacraments, that you would help us by faith to receive Christ as He is offered to us by His Spirit and to be strengthened by Him and to have a profound sense of His glory and majesty that would produce a deep-seated reverence in our souls toward Him. Please do this, Lord. Please, Father, if there be any here tonight that have no fear of God before their eyes, open their blind eyes to behold the glory of God in the face of Christ, that they might, from that sight, fear and honor Him. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.