Malachi 2:116 On Faithfulness

1
Malachi 21-16On Faithfulness

• Feb 3, 2008 Communion Sunday
• Lee Seetoo

2
Malachi 21-16

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3
Three Areas of Unfaithfulness

• 21-9
• Unfaithfulness of the PRIESTS contrasted with
  faithfulness of Levi
• 210-12
• Unfaithfulness of the PEOPLE in following
  foreign gods
• 213-16
• Unfaithfulness of HUSBANDS divorcing their
  Israelite wives to pursue pagan women

4
UNFAITHFULNESS
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(No Transcript)
6
Example of Levi

• Covenant of life and peace, fear
• God Himself was their inheritance
• Believers are now priests (1 Pe 29, Rev 16)
• The law of truth was in his mouth,
• and unrighteousness was not found on his lips.
• In peace and uprightness he walked with Me,
• and he turned many from iniquity.
• Malachi 26

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(No Transcript)
8
Jeremiah 36-10 (ESV)

• The LORD said to me in the days of King Josiah
• "Have you seen what she did, that faithless one,
  Israel, how she went up on every high hill and
  under every green tree, and there played the
  whore?
• And I thought, 'After she has done all this she
  will return to Me,' but she did not return, and
  her treacherous sister Judah saw it.
• She saw that for all the adulteries of that
  faithless one, Israel, I had sent her away
  with a decree of divorce.
• Yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear,
  but she too went and played the whore. Because
  she took her whoredom lightly, she polluted the
  land, committing adultery with stone and tree.
• Yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah
  did not return to Me with her whole heart, but in
  pretense, declares the LORD."

9
Jeremiah 311-14 (ESV)

• And the LORD said to me,
• "Faithless Israel has shown herself more
  righteous than treacherous Judah.
• Go, and proclaim these words toward the north,
  and say, "'Return, faithless Israel, declares the
  LORD. I will not look on you in anger, for I am
  merciful, declares the LORD I will not be angry
  forever.
• Only acknowledge your guilt, that you rebelled
  against the LORD your God and scattered your
  favors among foreigners under every green tree,
  and that you have not obeyed My voice, declares
  the LORD.
• Return, O faithless children, declares the LORD
  for I am your master I will take you, one from a
  city and two from a family, and I will bring you
  to Zion.

10
Marriage

• A picture of the relationship between God and His
  people or Christ and the Church
• Mixed marriages prohibited
• (not inter-racial, but inter-religious)

11
Deut 241-4 (ESV)

• When a man takes a wife and marries her, if then
  she finds no favor in his eyes because he has
  found some indecency in her, and he writes her a
  certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand
  and sends her out of his house, and she departs
  out of his house,
• and if she goes and becomes another man's wife,
• and the latter man hates her and writes her a
  certificate of divorce and puts it in her hand
  and sends her out of his house, or if the latter
  man dies, who took her to be his wife,
• then her former husband, who sent her away, may
  not take her again to be his wife, after she has
  been defiled, for that is an abomination before
  the LORD. And you shall not bring sin upon the
  land that the LORD your God is giving you for an
  inheritance.

12
Malachi 215-16

• - NIV
• Has not the Lord made them one? In flesh and
  spirit they are his. And why one? Because he was
  seeking godly offspring. So guard yourself in
  your spirit, and do not break faith with the wife
  of your youth.
• I hate divorce, says the Lord God of Israel,
  and I hate a man's covering himself with
  violence as well as with his garment, says the
  Lord Almighty. So guard yourself in your spirit,
  and do not break faith.
• - NLT
• Didn't the Lord make you one with your wife? In
  body and spirit you are his. And what does he
  want? Godly children from your union. So guard
  yourself remain loyal to the wife of your youth.
  
• "For I hate divorce!" says the Lord, the God of
  Israel. "It is as cruel as putting on a victim's
  bloodstained coat," says the Lord Almighty. "So
  guard yourself always remain loyal to your wife."

13
Malachi 215-16

• - NASB
• But not one has done so who has a remnant of the
  Spirit. And what did that one do while he was
  seeking a godly offspring? Take heed then to your
  spirit, and let no one deal treacherously against
  the wife of your youth.
• "For I hate divorce," says the LORD, the God of
  Israel, "and him who covers his garment with
  wrong," says the LORD of hosts. "So take heed to
  your spirit, that you do not deal treacherously."
• - NET Bible
• No one who has even a small portion of the
  Spirit in him does this. What did our ancestor
  do when seeking a child from God? Be attentive,
  then, to your own spirit, for one should not be
  disloyal to the wife he took in his youth.
• I hate divorce, says the Lord God of Israel,
  and the one who is guilty of violence, says the
  Lord who rules over all. Pay attention to your
  conscience, and do not be unfaithful.

14
Malachi 215-16

• - The Message
• GOD, not you, made marriage. His Spirit inhabits
  even the smallest details of marriage. And what
  does he want from marriage? Children of God,
  that's what. So guard the spirit of marriage
  within you. Don't cheat on your spouse.
• I hate divorce, says the GOD of Israel.
  GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies says, I hate the violent
  dismembering of the one flesh of marriage. So
  watch yourselves. Don't let your guard down.
  Don't cheat.
• - ESV
• 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 hates and divorces, says the
  LORD, the God of Israel, covers his garment with
  violence, says the LORD of hosts. So guard
  yourselves in your spirit, and do not be
  faithless."

15
The Bottom Line

• DO NOT
• break faith
• deal treacherously
• be faithless
• be unfaithful
• But instead,
• BE FAITHFUL

16
Covenant Faithfulness

• Under the Old Covenant
• Faithfulness obedience to the Law
• Under the New Covenant?
• Jesus fulfills the requirements
• Assurance God is faithful

17
Hebrews 86-9 (ESV) (quoting Jer 3131-34)

• But as it is, Christ has obtained a ministry
  that is as much more excellent than the old as
  the covenant He mediates is better, since it is
  enacted on better promises.
• For if that first covenant had been faultless,
  there would have been no occasion to look for a
  second.
• For He finds fault with them when He says
  "Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord,
  when I will establish a new covenant with the
  house of Israel and with the house of Judah,
• not like the covenant that I made with their
  fathers on the day when I took them by the hand
  to bring them out of the land of Egypt. For they
  did not continue in My covenant, and so I showed
  no concern for them, declares the Lord.

18
Hebrews 810-13 (ESV)

• For this is the covenant that I will make with
  the house of Israel after those days, declares
  the Lord I will put My laws into their minds,
  and write them on their hearts, and I will be
  their God, and they shall be My people.
• And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor
  and each one his brother, saying, 'Know the
  Lord,' for they shall all know Me, from the least
  of them to the greatest.
• For I will be merciful toward their iniquities,
  and I will remember their sins no more."
• In speaking of a new covenant, He makes the
  first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete
  and growing old is ready to vanish away. . . .

19
Hebrews 109b-14 (ESV)

• . . . He abolishes the first in order to
  establish the second.
• And by that will we have been sanctified through
  the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for
  all.
• And every priest stands daily at his service,
  offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which
  can never take away sins.
• But when Christ had offered for all time a
  single sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the
  right hand of God,
• waiting from that time until His enemies should
  be made a footstool for His feet.
• For by a single offering He has perfected for
  all time those who are being sanctified.

20
Hebrews 1015-23 (ESV)

• And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us
  for after saying,
• "This is the covenant that I will make with them
  after those days, declares the Lord I will put
  My laws on their hearts, and write them on their
  minds,"
• then He adds, "I will remember their sins and
  their lawless deeds no more."
• Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no
  longer any offering for sin.
• Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to
  enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus,
• by the new and living way that He opened for us
  through the curtain, that is, through His flesh,
• and since we have a great priest over the house
  of God,
• let us draw near with a true heart in full
  assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled
  clean from an evil conscience and our bodies
  washed with pure water.
• Let us hold fast the confession of our hope
  without wavering, for
• He Who promised is faithful.