God wants a family of believers-in-him from all nations, tongues and tribes, regardless of their gender, beliefs, past, sexual orientation, preferred pronouns or knowledge about Him. The follow-on from this is that just about anyone can come to believe in God and rekindle their relationship with the Creator of all. This follow-on is true but it is not as black and white as it may appear or as some of us may like it to be. God certainly wants a family of believers but the bottom-line for all those who believe is that our lives must be submitted wholeheartedly to Him.
A frequent pitfall for many people aspiring to be Christians or to grow in their Christianity is the lie that belief and acknowledgment of God without change or the proof thereof in our lives can count as Christianity. In reality, Christianity as identified by James in chapter 2 and verse 26 of his Book to the twelve tribes of Israel is a potent mix of faith (belief in God) and works (actions that prove the belief). So, while God wants a family of believers, there are terms on which He will accept them. At the heart of these terms is your required acceptance that you are going to have to let go of certain things and become who He wants you to be. Some things you may have to let go of include some past beliefs, certain sexual orientations and other things that will invariably become incompatible with Christian life if Christian life is a decision you intend to take seriously.
2 Corinthians 5:17 AMP puts it like this: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ [that is, grafted in, joined to Him by faith in Him as Savior], he is a new creature [reborn and renewed by the Holy Spirit]; the old things [the previous moral and spiritual condition] have passed away. Behold, new things have come [because spiritual awakening brings a new life].“
This is not a new idea in the bible. It is not groundbreaking. It is simply a consistent theme in all of God’s dealings with man which was no different in the time of Malachi: change from old to new is required to be in God’s family. This remarkable requirement is a testament to one of God’s unique features: uncompromising consistency. Of course, some can be in a journey from an old place to a new place. However, on the last day, on the day of Judgment, only the tangible change in you will speak to your salvation because no Christian can remain on the journey of salvation forever.
Chapter 2 of the book of Malachi is a microcosm of this idea of change in Christian life. It may be split into two tales: one story about the relationship between certain priests at the time and God, and another story about the relationship between the people of Israel (particularly the men) and God. Reading from the King James Version, the first part of verse 2 ties in a pretty bow what Christian life should not be. Which is to say that hearing from God, laying what has been heard to heart through relevant actions and giving glory to God is our Christian journey in a nutshell. The priests referred to in verse 1 were failing in these things and everything up to verse 9 is God’s reaction to them and their actions.
So, what is God actually saying? Well, his message is two-fold. Firstly, He is communicating His unhappiness with how things have transpired. So what exactly transpired? Verse 8 tells us. The priests in this passage had departed from God’s way – they had reverted back to the ‘old man’. Also, they had caused many others who looked to their example to stumble, while also corrupting God’s covenant with Levi the ancestral leader from whose descendants all priests were chosen. What was this covenant? Verse 5 details it. In exchange for life and peace from God, Levi and all that came after him were to live a life of reverence of God. So reverence is important but it is pointless without a life that exemplifies it. As was established in Part 1 of this series, God can tell the state of our hearts from our actions. So if God was the same yesterday as He is today and as He will be forever, it stands to reason that whoever He is and whatever He can do, He has always been and has always done.
We know that faith without works is dead. Now think of it this way: if the basis of our faith is a God who doesn’t change, then faith without work has always been dead whether we knew it or not. So, given that faith needs works, we can safely assume that Levi’s reverence for God was accompanied by proof of this reverence. We can also safely assume reverence from anyone without a way of life that lives that out has never been accepted by God and will never be. So, it is no surprise that the reverence which Levi had for God was also being expected from His descendants and it should come as no surprise that reverence for God is expected of us today. It is also safe to say that if we reverence God, given that He will do what He has always done, we will also get to partake in the covenant of life and peace which He promised Levi. To be clear, we will also be subject to some of the same criticisms if we fall short. God’s reaction to sin (not keeping his ways and applying his laws with preference to one part over another) is singular. In chapter 1, he was unequivocal in his reaction to Edom. In verse 9 of chapter 2, the same is seen as regards the priests.
When talking about the people of Israel (referred to interchangeably as Judah and Israel), he describes their treacherous dealings with each other and how they flouted the Ten Commandments given to Moses. He describes how they abused the holiness that God whom they once loved requires and have sought after other gods. He describes how the love of the men of the time had turned from their wives (and in essence, how their love for Him which encapsulates and is the origination of spousal love had turned) and how their sworn duty to these wives had moved to other attractions. In verse 15, speaking through Malachi, God decries the scourge of divorce, saying that He hates it. He describes how the tears of wives on His altar are drowned by the tears of their husbands whose prayers He has not answered because of how they have treated their wives. God’s response to the actions of the day by these people are pointed and clear. He threatens cutting people off from under the banner of Israel, he holds back from answering their prayers and He withholds His goodness. This is consistent with the picture of God painted in the Book of Psalms chapter 84 verse 11 where we see that He will not withhold any good thing from those who are upright.
The last verse of Malachi chapter 2 is particularly telling. It speaks of people who should know so much more about who God is but don’t. These are people who have likely had a brush with Christianity at some point or other in their lives either as teenagers, adolescents or adults. They most likely have been a part of a church, or grew up in the church and left it, or have been led astray through the grievous example of those in the church or people outside of it. At heart, these are people who have experienced God and have a kind of history with Him but have moved away from it. These people invariably see God as indifferent, quiet and as having no grand plan for the future. They may or may not have lost their faith or belief in His existence, but they have lost their belief in how and where they fit into the Christian story and family. They have lost all sense of purpose when it comes to a life with God. These are people who either say or believe or both believe and say that sin means nothing, that it is excusable, largely without consequence, necessary and of no meaning to man or God.
You have wearied the Lord with your words. 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?”
Malachi 2:17
There is no point in mincing words. God finds such people frustrating. Interestingly, these are not people who would identify as sinners, but instead these are people who would readily claim Christianity currently or at some point in their lives. Yet, what is remarkable and notable is that in the midst of God’s barely disguised frustration and disappointment is his consistent desire for reconciliation with these people who have wronged Him and who have wronged their neighbors. For example, the stark warning of verse 2 comes with a way to avoid what is being warned about (by hearing and laying to heart God’s messages). The warning of unanswered prayers mentioned in verses 13 to 16 is accompanied by advice on the steps that can be taken to avoid them (yielding control of one’s spirit to the Holy Spirit, guarding of the heart and remaining faithful in marriage).
God is uncompromising but not in the purely negative way that the word suggests. God knows and He also lets us know that He will not change His standards or His expectations for those who aspire to be in His family, but to account for this uncompromising nature He allows room for change knowing that we would all fall foul and hastily become extinct if He didn’t. In fact, God has remained consistent about allowing room for change – with Judgement Day as His only red line. By and through this, we end up in a situation where we have a God who is both endlessly upright and endlessly merciful – two things that would otherwise clash except in One as unchanging as He.
Be blessed.
That Christian Next Door 