The Second Sunday of Advent
The Second Sunday of Advent
Light of Christ Anglican Church
The Rev. Michael Moffitt December 8th, 2024
Malachi 3:1-15 “God Told Them That He Was Coming”
Years ago Teresa, our children and I spent a Saturday hiking along the Appalachian Trail outside of Roanoke. We did this often because it was beautiful, convenient, good for our health, and most important, it was free. Usually, after a day of hiking we were ready to eat a meal, although we carried snacks and water with us to refresh us while hiking. Sometimes on the way home we stopped at a fast-food restaurant or maybe 7-11, who had awesome hotdogs and chili, they still do, or so I’ve heard.
On this particular trip our son, Ben asked where we were going for dinner and I replied, “The Moffitt’s” and to my surprise He yelled out “YAY”.
Amy rolled her eyes and said, “Ben, we’re the Moffitt’s! We’re going home to eat!” He was clearly grieved at this news but still hadn’t made the connection to what I had replied.
As it ended up, Ben didn’t know his last name was Moffitt. This shocked me, he was probably 3-4 years old, and he didn’t know his last name. Of course, though this is an amusing story, in reality this was an important moment for Ben. This revelation over time helped him to understand that he was a part of something much larger than himself and was with those within the family who loved him and would be there for him. Now to a 3–4-year-old this doesn’t became a huge problem because they develop their sense of belonging based on the family they spend time with, which proved to be true for Ben. But what about a nation who has lost their identity as the people of God?
It's a greater problem when they believe they are the people of God but don’t know what that means according to God. With Israel the tragedy was that God had clearly defined for them, through His word given through the prophets what it meant to be the people of God, but repeatedly they rejected it for a substitute.
Tragically this has happened to much of the Protestant church in America. Christianity by virtue of the designation of the name, should indicate that this consisted of those who have become Christ followers, who found their direction from the Word of God. When that is ignored or seen as irrelevant the result can be the loss of identity with Christ in favor of human wisdom.
If you have just done a cursory reading of the Bible this should seem obvious. But misunderstanding or rejecting this this has always been the issue with those who believe that they follow God but one of their own imagination, not from the scriptures.
So when we begin to look at the Advent season we are alluding to the anticipation of the return of Jesus Christ as the conquering King. After defeating Satan by conquering sin and death He will bring the kingdom of God to earth at the end of the ages. It should be the greatest joy to those who know Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.
It’s what we’re looking for and our lives should have been given to the hope of that day when all will be restored, and we will be with our God and King forever. What happens if we see that promise in the Word of God but fail to appropriate it into our conscious awareness? When that’s the case it usually means that the promise has no real bearing on how we live, or more importantly for who we live. That becomes a real tragedy when the promises of God are just stories instead of life changing and the source of comfort and joy.
For those who do not know Jesus, it will be the beginning of a darkness and emptiness that we also have nothing to compare it too. No matter what darkness you may have experienced, it’s nothing in comparison to a place of the absence of God. That’s why the gospel message is so important.
Our commission to be the heralds of that message must be of first importance in our lives. Everything for all eternity is at stake and we must not become distracted by the things of this world that take our focus off the Great Commission Christ gave to the church. I wanted to begin our focus this morning with this reminder of the purpose of the church. This alone is the reason we should wait with such joyful expectation while being faithful to God’s call upon His people to be the bearers of this Good News.
We live in a time between the Advents and must have a double focus on the past and the future. We have the hope of the second coming because of the fulfillment of all that was foretold about the Messiah in the Scriptures concerning the first coming. God was faithful to his word then, which encourages us to fully trust that he will continue to accomplish all that he promised in his word. Advent symbolizes the spiritual journey of individuals and congregations, as they affirm that Christ has come, that through His word and Holy Spirit he is present in the world today and that He will come again in the future in power and glory. If we believe that to be true then it should matter a great deal and should change our focus on all of life.
Today we will consider the process of refining that God takes us through in preparation for the return of Jesus our Lord. We are all being prepared for the coming of the Kingdom of God in fullness by the refining fire and fullers’ soap of God.
We will primarily be considering Malachi 3:1–5 and its relationship to our gospel passage from Luke 3:1–6.
Let’s read again Malachi 3:1–2, “Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears. For he is like a refiners fire and a fullers’ soap.”
Our verse from Malachi is actually God’s response to the accusation brought about by Israel against Him in chapter 2:17,
“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?”
Let’s consider the setting for the Book of Malachi. The people of God were freed from captivity in Babylon, where they were slaves for 70 years. They had come back to Jerusalem and rebuilt the temple where sacrifices to God had resumed. Once again, the people had grown complacent and cold towards God and the holiness of his law. The Lord had grown weary that Israel continually rejected his authority and yet had the petulance to accuse him of not keeping his promises of protection. The people of Judah faced trials and threats from the nations surrounding them and longed for justice against their enemies.
Since God had not yet struck the enemies of Israel, they questioned his justice. God’s answer through the prophet Malachi was that he was going to come and set things right but before he came, he would send a messenger before him.
It was the usual practice in the Middle East for a messenger to be sent ahead of a visiting king to announce his coming and to remove any impediments or obstacles that would prevent or delay his coming.
Actually, the name Malachi means “my messenger” so there are three messengers here in this passage—Malachi, the forerunner, and the Messiah.
The prophet Malachi was responding to Israel that the answer to their complaint would be in fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy, that all people would see the salvation of God. The forerunner of the Messiah would be just like the prophet Malachi in that he would speak the Word of God, and it would be a declaration, a celebratory announcement of the one who was coming. It would be God himself coming in answer to the problem of injustice and ungodliness.
Every one of the Gospels has the announcement from Isaiah 40:3,
“The voice of the one crying out in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight…and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.”
Of course, we know that the forerunner or messenger was John the Baptist. In this time period the Jewish people were not only dissatisfied with being under Roman rule, but they also felt very little connection with their religious leaders.
It was under this context that John the Baptist chose to take his message out into the wilderness. There are two important considerations to be seen here.
1. There was unrest within the Jewish community due to Roman oppression and the disconnect of the people due to the arrogance and contempt of many of the Jewish religious leaders towards the people. They lorded their status over the very ones they were to actually serve and train.
2. The Jewish people took the prophetic word of Isaiah 40:3 literally. This told them that the forerunner of the Messiah would be “one crying out in the wilderness.” It was this wilderness, where John was preaching and it was not a safe place in general and on the surface, a place unfit to herald the coming of the redeemer. It was without law, filled with danger, bandits, and wild animals.
In Jewish tradition in the First Century, it was also seen as the abode of demons. Yet it is precisely in such darkness that light shines the brightest. John was the voice calling the people to prepare, and his call carried an element of warning, both for the individual and for the nation. However, his call was not strictly against the foreign rulers or the corrupt priests. In order to prepare, it was the people who were to repent (not rebel) and live in a manner that exemplified their true repentance. Jesus came to this earth as a redeemer for people in need of a redeemer.
They didn’t yet see that the time of repentance would be cleansing like a “fullers’ soap.” Most of us don’t have the context to understand what that is. It’s a step in woolen clothmaking that involves the cleansing of the cloth (particularly wool) to eliminate oils, dirt, and any other impurities, to make it thicker. It restored the wool or whatever cloth by bringing it to the place where it was at its greatest beauty and value. The one who was coming would bring the refining fire and purification that would be needed to prepare God’s people to live with him in his kingdom, and kingdom in the presence of the Lord who is holy, holy, holy.
It’s easy to read this passage and feel that it sounds like God is angry and is going to clobber them and whip them back into shape, but that isn’t the sense at all. God was pursuing his people out of love because what he has for them is so much more than they know or could even conceive. Their turning away from Him always led them into suffering and sorrow instead of blessing and peace.
We must acknowledge the need for both personal and national repentance. Journeying through advent where we remember Jesus’ first coming and prepare for His return, our preparation should follow the same pattern of repentance that John preached—hear the prophetic word of God’s wrath towards our hypocrisy, repent, and bear fruit in keeping with repentance in holiness and purity. As we look towards Jesus’ second coming this advent season, there is no better time for the Church to go out into those darkest of places, even where the demons abide, and be a voice that calling out for repentance and a return to the Lord.
The Messiah’s coming would not be in the way they had assumed or for the reasons that they wanted. The Messiah would come suddenly to the temple bringing judgment against those who profaned it. The members of the post-exilic community that were complaining that God was unjust, weren’t seeking God’s messenger for reasons of their love for God and his word but because they believed that the coming of the messenger would lead to God’s judgment on the nations around them.
They would discover, however, that the messenger would first bring judgment against them. He would not only prepare them but he was the one who would purify and judge their nation. He would accomplish a complete transformation of their impure sacrificial practices but would also deal with the ungodliness within the nation of priests. The nation of Israel had become so corrupt that they no longer saw how much they had become like the other nations or how far away they had turned from God and his commands.
One of the main tasks of a prophet was to warn communities with whom God was displeased. Often, these were people who were under a false impression that they were following the Torah, the guidance of God who thus should have been delighted in their righteous and holy living. However, they were not following the entirety of the Torah and chose which portions they would follow, falling well short of the life God called them to live. This irony should make us all ask whether we are deceiving ourselves by doing the things we believe God desires when He requires an obedience that is fuller and truer to His desires. The Levites would have understood the words of the covenants—the doctrines, theologies, and even practical applications of those doctrines. But upon the return of the Lord, He won’t ask if we understood the theologies; He’ll judge us on whether we have pure and undefiled religion—such as not oppressing the worker in their wages and visiting the orphan and the widow in their affliction.
As we have seen recently in other sermons God was addressing those within Israel who were so confident of their standing with God that they believed the “Day of the Lord” would be to their benefit. They had not realized that their flagrant violations of God ‘s covenant actually made them enemies of God, the objects of his wrath.
Malachi addresses the seriousness of the coming of the messenger when he says, “Who can endure the day of his coming, says the Lord of hosts?” The nation had become so corrupt that virtually all would be condemned when God rendered judgment. Through Malachi God was promising that he was indeed coming but it will be to refine and purify his people, and he would begin with the Levitical priesthood. The priests had been instrumental in leading the people astray, so he would start there, but it would extend to all the nation. The priests were a pattern for the nation, but God told Israel at Sinai that they were to be a “kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). The goal of the messenger of the covenant was that the heart and the lives of God’s people would be purified, and their worship would become a proper response to God Almighty, which in turn would provide them with spiritual, social, economic blessings and the joy of an intimate relationship with their God. Let’s read Malachi 3:3–4,
“He will sit as refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord as in the days of old and as in former years.”
Charles Spurgeon wrote this observation on Malachi, “If any of you, my hearers, are seeking the Lord at this time, I want you to understand what it means: you are seeking a fire which will test you and consume much which has been dear to you. We are not to expect Christ to come and save us in our sins, he will come and save us from our sins; therefore, if you are enabled by faith to take Christ as a Savior, remember that you take him as the refiner and the purifier, for it is from sin that he saves us.”
It is sin that separates us from God so if we would turn from our sins and follow the Lord Jesus, we must be prepared for the refiners fire and the fuller’ soap.
I love the picture that Malachi paints for us here. Often people feel that God is distant and impersonal, not unlike the teachings of the deist, who believe that God set the world spinning then walked away saying, “good luck”. Instead God promises to “sit as a refiner and purifier of silver…and refine them like gold and silver.”
I’ve read articles about the refining of silver and gold. The refiner pays close attention to the process, so he can remove the impurities from the metal as they are released by the fire and rise to the surface. He patiently removes the impurity that rises to the top and then waits for what’s left. He knows the temperature that will refine as opposed to the temperature that will burn it up. He lovingly removes the dross and knows that when he can see his image in the metal that it is pure. He takes the time to complete the process because he knows the value of the silver or gold. When he first receives it, he doesn’t evaluate it solely based on the condition that it’s in, but on the condition that it will be in when he finishes.
The refining process, though time-consuming, brings the silver or gold to the place of beauty that it was intended to have where it can demonstrate its real value.
That was God’s heart for his people Israel, that they might reflect his image as they were originally intended. Then they would be able to bring an offering of praise and worship that is pleasing to the Lord and produces the life-giving joy and satisfaction that was to be man's life in the beginning.
Let’s look at the final section of our passage. Malachi 3:5,
“Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against the those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts.”
Our section began with the religious cynics accusing the Lord of injustice. It ends with a legal charge of covenant unfaithfulness in which the Lord brings charges against his people. The specific sins mentioned in verse 5 were clearly forbidden in the law of God. The root cause was the lack of the fear of God and that was what needed to be remedied.
So, what is to be our take away from this passage? I think there are three things for us to take with us into this Advent season.
1. God involves himself in the lives of those whom he loves. J.I. Packer in his book “Knowing God” wrote, “Still he seeks the fellowship of his people and sends them both sorrows and joys in order to detach their love from the things of this world and attach them to himself."
God seeks intimacy with us and will do what it takes to bring us into a right relationship with him. We all have those areas where we stumble or are struggling and experiencing suffering. It could be sickness, or financial, or relational but whatever it is the design is for you to grow closer in intimacy with God. God strengthens us, he deepens our roots and gives us a firmer grip on his hand. When struggles happen, we know that we are not abandoned but that God is at work refining us.
2. Paul wrote in Romans 5:3,
“Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
This one can really be difficult, I admit. I can remind myself that I am supposed to consider it all joy when I face various trials, but actually rejoicing in those trials is another matter. Paul teaches us that all these things are designed to build endurance, character, and hope as we grow in our relationship with God and face the inevitable struggles of this life. If Jesus is the most important one in our lives then losing something of lesser importance, even our health doesn’t seem like a complete loss.
3. The Advent season is a time of anticipation and longing and often that has everything to do with hoping that Jesus will return soon and set up his kingdom and that is the ultimate hope. However, our passage today points us to a deeper longing for Jesus to refine and purify us so that we become the bride that is fit for the King and become those who live for the glory and delight of our beloved. Not only has he given us his Word and Holy Spirit, but he promises to be working on our relationship with his refining fire and fullers’ soap. Rather than dreading what that may look like, our hearts should yearn to be more and more a reflection of Jesus Christ. Let’s pray
