Message of Love (Malachi 1:1-5)

The period in which Malachi lived and ministered is roughly the same time as Nehemiah was working to rebuild the ruined city of Jerusalem. Therefore, it is useful for us to read the books of Nehemiah and Malachi together because they will give us a bigger picture of the problems that each faced and the messages that God sent to his people at that time. 

The provision of a politician (Nehemiah) and a prophet (Malachi) is also a reminder to us of God’s grace to his people in that he caters for all that is necessary for spiritual restoration to occur. This grace of God is further enhanced when we realise that there had been another attempt at restoration a couple of decades before through the work of Ezra and Zechariah the prophet.

Malachi describes his message as a burden given to him by the Lord. In calling it a burden, the prophet is saying that he did not find his message an easy thing to bear. Just as we are aware when we are carrying a load, so Malachi was aware of this weight on his heart. His message was not detached from him. Instead, he felt it deeply and that is how all of God’s messengers should feel.

A backsliding people

It is evident from the book of Malachi that the people were questioning God’s commitment to them. This expression of unbelief may have been due to the two failed attempts at restoration (first under Zerubbabel and more recently under Ezra). Both these attempts had begun well, contained mountain-top experiences, but had eventually declined). The people may have asked, ‘Why did God not restore us to the heights that our forefathers knew during the reigns of David and Solomon, especially since many of the prophets predicted that he would?’ In any case, disillusionment had crept in to the thinking of the people of God. It is usually true that disillusionment and doubt go hand-in-hand.

Perhaps the problem was connected to what has been called the second or third generation factor. God does something special for one generation, but the next generations fail to build on it. If this was the problem, it would have been enhanced by the fact that these Israelites had known more than one occasion when God had done something special. What are the signs of this factor? I would suggest that what has been called ‘dead orthodoxy’, where there is a focus on correct doctrine and little else. Obviously correct doctrine is essential, but it is not the only essential. We have only to think of the church in Ephesus described in Revelation 2, with all its orthodoxy, but with little love for God.

A second feature of this generational factor is a sense of stability, and we can see this in the people of Malachi’s day. They had been given political stability by the Persian Empire, they had been given religious stability by the re-introduction of the temple worship in Jerusalem, they had material stability because of the improved government structures of the time. 

Yet despite possessing correct doctrine and pleasant stability, their zeal for God had declined. The leaders regarded the public worship of God as boring (ch. 1) and the people refused to pay their tithes and offerings to God (ch. 3). Their hearts were not warm towards God.

God’s first response through Malachi, and we will see further divine responses later on, is to remind his people of his sovereignty, and that in two areas. The first area concerns God’s special love for his people in contrast to his rejection of others; the second area concerns how this discriminating love works itself out in providence.

The God of special love

Many find fault with the doctrine of election, but what they cannot deny is that it is found in the Bible. True, it can be handled wrongfully, and in such a way great damage can be done. This doctrine is revealed in order to stimulate our worship and to provide spiritual comfort. It is a matter for great adoration that God made loving choices.

This eternal choice of God has many aspects to it. First, it is unconditional (God did not consult with others whom he should choose); second, it is unchanging (God will not reject those whom he has chosen); third, it is undeserved (the objects of his choice had no merit).  

Malachi says here that God hated Esau. Attempts have been made to make this strong expression mean ‘love less’, which is based on a Hebrew idiom. The idiom is seen in two passages. First, it is seen in Jacob’s hatred of Leah in contrast to his love for Rachel: ‘When the Lord saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb, but Rachel was barren’ (Gen. 29:31). Yet the previous verse says that Jacob ‘loved Rachel more than Leah’, which implies that the hatred for Leah refers to a lesser love. Second, the idiom is used by Jesus in Luke 14:26: ‘If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.’ Obviously, Jesus is not asking his disciples to break the fifth commandment, but he is requiring them to put him before their families and personal prospects. 

God’s hatred is according to his attributes. He hates what is evil, not merely the evil actions but the heart and mind that brings it about. ‘The Lord tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence’ (Ps. 11:5). This hatred is part of God’s perfections, but it is expressed towards those who live in such a way as to deserve his hostility. We have to remember that this is the kind of man Esau was. Like everyone else, he did not deserve God’s love, and like many others he was not the object of God’s special love. The passage in Malachi does not indicate that the Lord was good to Esau at all, whether to him personally or to his descendants spiritually. It cannot be explained by suggesting it means ‘love less’. Although we cannot understand it, we have to accept that it is an attitude found in God, and which God uses as a proof of his love for his own people.

When we think of God’s electing love of his people, we are to remember that it is not the only kind of love that God has. In addition to this expression of love, there are also other manifestations of his love. For example, there is the love that is known between each of the persons of the Trinity or there is the universal love that he bears to all people in a general sense. It is wrong to assume that because electing love is true, God does not have a genuine love for the world. The fact that we cannot reconcile them does not mean that they do not exist. An illustration that may help us is the way that each of us loves at different levels: we love as children of parents, we love as brothers and sisters in a family, we love as parents and grandparents of children, we love as friends, we love as fellow countrymen etc. 

Also when we think of the nation of Israel, we have to remember that there is an election within the nation as well as an election of the nation. Paul discusses this aspect in Romans 9–11. The promises of spiritual blessing are not given to the nation as a whole, but to the chosen remnant. As Paul says, the nation as a whole was eventually cast off, but the blessings were given to the remnant of grace, and his argument is that converted Gentiles join this believing remnant of Israel as the inheritors of God’s purpose and promises.

Further, election is not a barrier to conversion. Some people deduce from election that it is possible to want to be converted but God will refuse that desire. That is nonsense. Election is a secret, and no-one knows that they are among the elect until they believe in Jesus. If you want to be saved, you should ask Jesus to save you, and he will.

The Lord was fully aware that the people were questioning his commitment to them. Nevertheless he approached them in a tender and compassionate manner and reminded them that he loves them. While we know that the Lord is not a human and not possessed of human weaknesses, we are still to recall that he is often a disappointed Lover. What does a Lover want from the object of his affections? He wants love in return, and this reciprocal love had been denied to God. Many times the Lord complains of this lack of loving response, with perhaps the most moving being his messages through the prophet Hosea, vividly illustrated by Hosea’s problems with his wife Gomer. T.V. Moore describes God’s approach here as follows: ‘It is like the language of a weeping parent, who seeks to woo back a prodigal child, by recalling to his memory the love that has been lavished upon him.’

This love of God was obviously marked by compassion and commitment. It is marked by compassion because the Lord regrets that their disobedience has deprived them of his great blessings. And it is marked by commitment because he has not cast them away but has returned again and again with offers of restoration.

This love of God had also been marked by chastisement. This is the reason why things were not going well with them. They had questioned the faithfulness of God to his covenant promises and concluded his disloyalty was the root of the problems they faced. In reality, the root of the problems was their unfaithfulness to him, and for that they were punished by him. But this chastisement had taken place in order to restore them.

Another feature of God’s amazing love here was its condescension. In response to their insensitive and ignorant response to his overture of love, he proceeded to answer their question. God’s answer informs us that his people were guilty of a bad memory: they forgot their history and they forgot his power. Regarding their response to their history, Moore comments: ‘They refuse to look at the tokens of love strewn all along their history, and dwell in obstinate ingratitude on the evils that their own sin has entailed upon them.’ They had great moments to recall: the call of Abraham, the Exodus from Egypt, the provision of Canaan, the presence of the Temple, the restoration from Babylon and many others. Yet they had forgotten how good the Lord had been throughout their history, how patient he had been, how forgiving he had been when they had repented.

The history of Edom in recent times should have been noted by them. Although Edom had avoided the captivity of Babylon, they were later defeated by the Nabateans (an Arab grouping) who forced the Edomites to leave their territory and dwell in the region south of Judah. Although history says that the Nabateans did it, Malachi says in verse 3 that God did it: ‘I have laid waste his hill country and left his heritage to jackals of the desert.’ The Book of Obadiah says that this would happen because of Edom’s cruelty to the children of Judah as they were led into exile (vv. 10-12). And this fate that came upon Edom was also in response to the solemn prayers offered up by the children of Israel during the exile in Babylon: ‘Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites the day of Jerusalem, how they said, “Lay it bare, lay it bare, down to its foundations!”’ (Ps. 137:7). Now Israel was restored, and Edom was in ruins.

Malachi mentions the hopes that the Edomites had that their kingdom would be rebuilt. An interesting connection is the fact that Nehemiah had engaged in the great task of rebuilding the ruins of Jerusalem and had succeeded. In contrast, the Lord by his mighty power would prevent the Edomites from ever restoring their kingdom. This was evidence of the Lord’s love to his people. As they observed this frustration of the plans of Edom, the prophet says in verse 5 that they were to praise God and say, ‘Great is the Lord beyond the border of Israel!’ 

What is the lesson of these verses for us? Simply, it is that if we are the Lord’s people, the Lord deals with us in grace and providence in the way that we do not deserve because of our sins. Instead, he deals with us in love, a love that chose us, that shows compassion and commitment to us, that chastises us when we need it, that condescends to comfort us, and that controls every moment of history for our benefit. The people in Malachi’s day had forgotten this wonderful reality and their religious life became a mess.