'Behold, I will send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way
before Me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to His
temple, even the Messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in:
behold, He shall come, saith the Lord of Hosts. 2. But who may
abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth?
for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap: 3. And He
shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and He shall purify
the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may
offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness. 4. Then shall the
offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in
the days of old, and as in former years. 5. And I will come near to
you to judgment; and I will be a swift Witness against the
sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers,
and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the
widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from
his right, and fear not Me, saith the Lord of Hosts. 6. For I am
the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not
consumed. 7. Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away
from mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto Me, and I
will return unto you, saith the Lord of Hosts. But ye said, Wherein
shall we return? 8. Will a man rob God? Yet ye have robbed Me.
But ye say, Wherein have we robbed Thee? In tithes and offerings.
9. Ye are cursed with a curse: for ye have robbed Me, even this
whole nation. 10. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that
there may be meat in Mine house, and prove Me now herewith, saith
the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven,
and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to
receive it. 11. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and
he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your
vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of
Hosts. 12. And all nations shall call you blessed: for ye shall be
a delightsome land, saith the Lord of Hosts.'--MALACHI iii. 1-12.
Deep obscurity surrounds the person of this last of the prophets. It is
questioned whether Malachi is a proper name at all. It is the Hebrew
word rendered in verse 1 of our passage 'My messenger,' and this has led
many authorities to contend that the prophecy is in fact anonymous, the
name being only a designation of office. Whether this is so or not, the
name, if it is a name, is all that we know about him. The tenor of his
prophecy shows that he lived after the restoration of the Temple and its
worship, and the sins which he castigates are substantially those with
which Ezra and Nehemiah had to fight. One ancient Jewish authority
asserts that he was Ezra; but the statement has no confirmation, and if
it had been correct, we should not have expected that such an author
would have been anonymous. This dim figure, then, is the last of the
mighty line of prophets, and gives strong utterance to the 'hope of
Israel'! One clear voice, coming from we scarcely know whose lips,
proclaims for the last time, 'He comes! He comes!' and then all is
silence for four hundred years. Modern critics, indeed, hold that the
bulk of the Psalter is of later date; but that contention has much to do
before it can be regarded as established.
The first point worthy of notice in this passage, then, is the
concentration, in this last prophetic utterance, of that element of
forward-looking expectancy which marked all the earlier revelation. From
the beginning, the selectest spirits in Israel had set their faces and
pointed their fingers to a great future, which gathered distinctness as
the ages rolled, and culminated in the King from David's line, of whom
many psalms sung, and in the suffering Servant of the Lord, who shines
out from the pages of the second part of Isaiah's prophecy. This
Messianic hope runs through all the Old Testament, like a broadening
river. 'They that went before cried, Hosanna! Blessed is He that
cometh.'
That hope gives unity to the Old Testament, whatever criticism may have
to teach about the process of its production. The most important thing
about the book is that one purpose informs it all; and the student who
misses the truth that 'the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy'
has a less accurate conception of the meaning and inter-relations of the
Old Testament than the unlearned who has accepted that great truth. We
should be willing to learn all that modern scholarship has to teach
about the course of revelation. But we should take care that the new
knowledge does not darken the old certainty that the prophets 'testified
beforehand of the sufferings of Christ and of the glory that should
follow,' Here, at the very end, stands Malachi, reiterating the
assurance which had come down through the centuries. The prophets, as it
were, had lit a beacon which flamed through the darkness. Hand after
hand had flung new fuel on it when it burned low. It had lighted up many
a stormy night of exile and distress. Now we can dimly see one more, the
last of his order, casting his brand on the fire, which leaps up again;
and then he too passes into the darkness, but the beacon burns on.
The next point to note is the clear prophecy of a forerunner. 'My
messenger' is to come, and to 'prepare the way before Me.' Isaiah had
heard a voice calling, 'Prepare the way of the Lord,' and Malachi quotes
his words, and ascribes the same office to the 'messenger.' In the last
verses of his prophecy he calls this messenger 'Elijah the prophet.'
Here, then, we have a remarkable instance of a historical detail set
forth in prophecy. The coming of the Lord is to be immediately preceded
by the appearance of a prophet, whose function is to effect a moral and
religious reformation, which shall prepare a path for Him. This is no
vague ideal, but definite announcement of a definite fact, to be
realised in a historical personality. How came this half-anonymous Jew,
four hundred years beforehand, to hit upon the fact that the next
prophet in Israel would herald the immediate coming of the Lord? There
ought to be but one answer possible.
Another point to note is the peculiar relation between Jehovah and Him
who comes. Emphatically and broadly it is declared that Jehovah Himself
'shall suddenly come to His temple'; and then the prophecy immediately
passes on to speak of the coming of 'the Messenger of the covenant,'
and dwells for a time exclusively on his work of purifying; and then
again it glides, without conscious breach of continuity or mark of
transition, into, 'And _I_ will come near to you in judgment.' A
mysterious relationship of oneness and yet distinctness is here
shadowed, of which the solution is only found in the Christian truth
that the Word, which was Grod, and was in the beginning with God, became
flesh, and that in Him Jehovah in very deed tabernacled among men. The
expression 'the Messenger (or Angel) of the covenant' is connected with
the remarkable representations in other parts of the Old Testament, of
'the Angel of Jehovah,' in whom many commentators recognise a
pre-incarnate manifestation of the eternal Word. That 'Angel' had
redeemed Israel from Egypt, had led them through the desert, had been
the 'Captain of the Lord's host.' The name of Jehovah was 'in Him.' He
it is whose coming is here prophesied, and in His coming Jehovah comes
to His temple.
We next note the aspect of the coming which is prominent here. Not the
kingly, nor the redemptive, but the judicial, is uppermost. With keen
irony the Prophet contrasts the professed eagerness of the people for
the appearance of Jehovah and their shrinking terror when He does come.
He is 'the Lord whom ye seek'; the Messenger of the covenant is He 'whom
ye delight in.' But all that superficial and partially insincere longing
will turn into dread and unwillingness to abide His scrutiny. The images
of the refiner's fire and the fullers' soap imply painful processes, of
which the intention is to burn out the dross and beat out the filth. It
sounds like a prolongation of Malachi's voice when John the Baptist
peals out his herald cry of one whose 'fan was in His hand,' and who
should plunge men into a fiery baptism, and consume with fire that
destroyed what would not submit to be cast into the fire that cleansed.
Nor should we forget that our Lord has said, 'For judgment am I come
into the world.' He came to 'purify'; but if men would not let Him do
what He came for, He could not but be their bane instead of their
blessing.
The stone is laid. If we build on it, it is a sure foundation; if we
stumble over it, we are broken. The double aspect and effect of the
gospel, which was meant only to have the single operation of blessing,
are clearly set forth in this prophecy, which first promises purging
from sin, so that not only the 'sons of Levi' shall offer in
righteousness, but that the 'offerings of Judah and Jerusalem shall be
pleasant,' and then passes immediately to foretell that God will come in
judgment and witness against evil-doers. Judgment is the shadow of
salvation, and constantly attends on it. Neither Malachi nor the Baptist
gives a complete view of Messiah's work, but still less do they give an
erroneous one; for the central portion of both prophecies is His
purifying energy which both liken to cleansing fire.
That real and inward cleansing is the great work of Christ. It was
wrought on as many of His contemporaries as believed on Him, and for
such as did not He was a swift Witness against them. Nor are we to
forget that the prophecy is not exhausted yet; for there remains another
'day of His coming' for judgment. The prophets did not see the
perspective of the future, and often bring together events widely
separated in time, just as, to a spectator on a mountain, distances
between points far away towards the horizon are not measurable. We have
to allow for foreshortening.
This blending of events historically widely apart is to be kept in view
in interpreting Malachi's prediction that the coming would result in
Judah's and Israel's offerings being 'pleasant unto the Lord as in
former years.' That prediction is not yet fulfilled, whether we regard
the name of Israel and the relation expressed in it as having passed
over to the Christian Church, or whether we look forward to that
bringing in of all Israel which Paul says will be as 'life from the
dead.' But by slow degrees it is being fulfilled, and by Christ men are
being led to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God.
The more directly Messianic part of this prophecy is closed in verse 6
by a great saying, which at once gives the reason for the coming and for
its severe aspect of witness against sin. The unchangeableness of God,
which is declared in His very name, guarantees the continued existence
of Israel. As Paul says in regard to the same subject, 'The calling of
God is without change of purpose' (on His part). But it is as impossible
that God should leave them to their sins, which would destroy them, as
that He should Himself consume them. Therefore He will surely come; and
coming, will deliver from evil. But they who refuse to be so delivered
will forfeit that title and the pledge of preservation which it implies.
A new paragraph begins with verse 7, which is not closely connected with
the promises preceding. It recurs to the prevailing tone of Malachi, the
rebuke of negligence in attending to the legal obligations of worship.
That negligence is declared to be a reason for God's withdrawal from
them. But the 'return,' which is promised on condition of their renewed
obedience, can scarcely be identified with the coming just foretold.
That coming was to bring about offerings of righteousness which should
be pleasant to the Lord. This section (vs. 7-12) promises blessings as
results of such offerings, and a 'return' of Jehovah to His people
contingent upon their return to Him. If the two sections of this passage
are taken as closely connected, this one must describe the consequences
of the coming. But, more probably, this accusation of negligence and
promise of blessing on a change of conduct are independent of the
previous verses. We, however, may fairly take them as exhibiting the
obligations of those who have received that great gift of purifying from
Jesus Christ, and are thereby consecrated as His priests.
The key-word of the Christian life is 'sacrifice'--surrender, and that
to God. That is to be stamped on the inmost selves, and by the act of
the will, on the body as well. 'Yield yourselves to God, and your
members as instruments of righteousness to Him.' It is to be written on
possessions. Malachi necessarily keeps within the limits of the
sacrificial system, but his impetuous eloquence hits us no less. It is
still possible to 'rob God.' We do so when we keep anything as our own,
and use it at our own will, for our own purposes. Only when we recognise
His ownership of ourselves, and consequently of all that we call 'ours,'
do we give Him His due. All the slave's chattels belong to the owner to
whom he belongs. Such thorough-going surrender is the secret of thorough
possession. The true way to enjoy worldly goods is to give them to God.
The lattices of heaven are opened, not to pour down, as of old, fiery
destruction, but to make way for the gentle descent of God's blessing,
which will more than fill every vessel set to receive it. This is the
universal law, not always fulfilled in increase of outward goods, but in
the better riches of communion and of larger possession in God Himself.
He suffers no man to be His creditor, but more than returns our gifts,
as legends tell of some peasant who brought his king a poor tribute of
fruits of his fields, and went away from the presence-chamber with a
jewel in his hand.