After the return of exile, people began to become discouraged, as it seemed that God’s promises were not fulfilled; this discouragement is reflected in the worship given to God (today, equally, when people become discouraged, stop going to worship) Malachi then appears, seeking to restore the worship of God.
God exhorts people to worship and love God because He loved us first and chose us to be His people.
- In Malachi.
- God teaches that He does not accept worship other than prescribed worship.
- In worship.
- Sincerity is not enough; we must worship God as he has decided.
- We cannot invent ways to worship God; The worship that pleases God seeks to worship Him as he has revealed that he wants to be worshipped.
The priests of malachi’s time became corrupted and stopped teaching God’s people. The Lord says he would make this leadership unclean so that it can be removed from the people.
People wept, moaned, and cried out to God, but God rejected their worship (v. 13), because they lived in sin (marry worshippers of a foreign god?V. 11; adultery and divorce for no reason? V. 14-15) ).
The people doubted the justice of God and the Lord says that he would go to justice against his people, against those of God’s people who practiced iniquity, sending his messenger (John the Baptist) and then the Angel of the Covenant (Christ ) to establish a new covenant, purify the people (v. 3) so that they can offer a nice offering (v. 4). Worship should be an expression of our total consecration to God.
God shows an example that people had turned away from God: they robbed God in the form of tithes and offerings, not that God needed that money, but it was a sign that they were not there, the pocket is one of the last to convert and the NT says generosity and liberality are a sign of conversion
The people grunted, because the wicked prospered, and they said there was no point in serving God. The Lord says that the day would come when the difference between the wicked and the righteous would be clear, but even then his servants were not to worship him for what he gives, but for who he is: the God who chose and loved them with the love of the alliance . .
God says that the day of judgment will come upon the wicked and then everyone will know that the Lord is worth worshiping.
1. Today we have services totally focused on prosperity, in which people worship God as a market to obtain God’s blessings. Cults for material prosperity are a deviation from the correct worship of Dios. La test of God’s love is not financial prosperity, but their choice and covenant.
We also see churches restoring elements of the old covenant (baptism in Jordan, ark of the covenant, and other Jewish elements), when Malachi shows us here that the Angel of the Covenant would return and that the Hebrews say that such things were shadows. In worshipping God, the question is not whether it is forbidden, but whether it is ordained.
God not only cares that the service is performed as ordered, but also that it is performed with all the heart.
Worship is not only celebration and celebration, but there is also room for exhortation and lament (Jacq 4. 9).