The Despising of God Expressed

"A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? says the LORD of hosts to you, O priests, who despise my name. But you say, 'How have we despised your name?' By offering polluted food upon my altar. But you say, 'How have we polluted you?' By saying that the LORD's table may be despised. When you offer blind animals in sacrifice, is that not evil? And when you offer those that are lame or sick, is that not evil? Present that to your governor; will he accept you or show you favor? says the LORD of hosts. And now entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious to us. With such a gift from your hand, will he show favor to any of you? says the LORD of hosts. Oh that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, says the LORD of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand. For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering. For my name will be great among the nations, says the LORD of hosts. But you profane it when you say that the Lord's table is polluted, and its fruit, that is, its food may be despised. But you say, 'What a weariness this is,' and you snort at it, says the LORD of hosts. You bring what has been taken by violence or is lame or sick, and this you bring as your offering! Shall I accept that from your hand? says the LORD. Cursed be the cheat who has a male in his flock, and vows it, and yet sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished. For I am a great King, says the LORD of hosts, and my name will be feared among the nations. (Mal 1:6-14 ESV)

Now that we’ve seen how the despising of God is revealed, both in the people and their leaders, we move on to see how this despising of God is EXPRESSED.

God brings two specific charges against His people in how they express their hatred of Him. These charges are:

• Dishonoring the greatness of God as their Father in their failure to worship
  
• Disrespecting the greatness of God as their King in their approach to worship
  

In vv. 7-10 we see how the people dishonored God the Father in their failure to worship…

7 By offering polluted food upon my altar…8 When you offer blind animals in sacrifice…And when you offer those that are lame or sick…9 …With such a gift from your hand, will he show favor to any of you? says the LORD of hosts. 10…I have no pleasure in you, says the LORD of hosts, and I will not accept an offering from your hand.

The Scripture is clear in what God demands of us…

"If his offering is a burnt offering from the herd, he shall offer a male without blemish… (Lev 1:3 ESV)

God demands our best, not our leftovers. Those who bring God what they would not dare bring to their earthly governors dishonor God in their failure to worship, because we can’t properly worship God unless we first honor Him. We can’t insult Him with our offerings without incurring His just discipline. So how does God respond to the people who are disrespecting Him in this way?...

He challenges them to bring their leftovers to their earthly governors. You see, God knew by their actions that they feared earthly rulers more than Him. He knew that they would not dare disrespect those who could place their body under subjection, but they had no problem with disrespecting God who had their souls in subjection as well. Christ Himself tells us to …

…not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Mat 10:28 ESV)

Where do you stand today? Are you willing to give God His due, or are you content with giving Him your leftovers? Do you give the IRS what is due them because you fear what they can do to you? We should all fear God more than the IRS and be sure that we give Him our first-fruits. Not just the first-fruits of our money, but also of our devotion and time. God deserves and demands the best of all that we have, He’s not content with our money alone.

God’s response against those who give Him their second-best is to not receive them. If you don’t expect the IRS to treat you favorably when you cheat them, don’t expect God to treat you favorably when you cheat Him.

Not only does God not receive such into His favorable presence, He also tells us that He’s not pleased with them. God tells them that if this is the kind of worship they bring to Him they shouldn’t even come to worship Him. The offerings that are meant to be a sweet smelling savor to God become a stench in His nostrils when they’re given with such a selfish heart.

God doesn’t only respond to the way He’s despised among His people, He also gives correction. He tells them that His name will be great among the nations, and that they will worship Him properly. How much more then should these, His people, worship Him properly?

God uses the Gentile nations to stir Israel to jealousy that they might return to honoring God properly. Paul tells us that God uses this same paradigm when he says of Israel that …

…through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. (Rom 11:11 ESV)

What about us? Are we stirred to jealousy when we see those who are not of God’s household being more faithful in some things than we are? When we see Jehovah’s Witnesses constantly witnessing to people about their faith, are we convicted by our lack of witness? Seeing that they are so faithful with a message that’s not from God, shouldn’t we be more faithful with our message that is from God? When we see them giving so much of their time, energy, and resources to their faith…are we moved to jealousy and provoked to walk with the true God with more devotion?

Not only do the Israelites dishonor God as their Father in their failure to worship, they also disrespect God as their King in their approach to worship. Look at how little they really cared about worshiping God. Our passage tells us that they said, “what a weariness this is,” and they snorted at it (v.13). They saw the worship of an infinitely holy, glorious, loving, perfect God as something that had become tiresome, boring, mundane, and common.

God had given His people the wonderful blessing of drawing near to Him in corporate worship, and they defiled it as if it was something unimportant, something to “get over with” rather than enjoying the time spent with God in worship.

How many who claim the name “Christian” for themselves in our time and our culture fall into this same sin of despising God in our approach to Him? How many can’t wait until their Sunday hour is up so that they can stop worshipping and go on to more important things…like watching football or going out to lunch?

Let this passage from Malachi be a stern warning to us. May we be drawn to repentance and strive for a closer walk with Christ as we begin to grow in our love for corporate worship. When we come to God in this most holy convocation, I pray that we would be stirred with a love for Him. And by that love for Christ we would be consumed with a desire to worship Him…not as a matter of duty and obligation that we must “put up with,” but rather as a sincere outworking of the love that we have for our great Lord and Savior.

There is nothing common about the worship of God. If we have become casual and common in our approach to it, then the problem is with us. And just as God condemns His children in the book of Malachi, so He condemns us as well. May we heed our Lord’s discipline and turn back to a more complete love of Christ.

God’s response to this kind of worship in our passage is two-fold: He did not receive their worship, and He cursed them. We see this clearly when we read God’s response to their tainted worship in vv. 13-14:

13…Shall I accept that from your hand? says the LORD. 14 Cursed be the cheat who has a male in his flock, and vows it, and yet sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished. For I am a great King, says the LORD of hosts…

The fact that we only earn the disapproval and curse of God with improper worship should stir us to a careful examination of how we worship Him. The worship of God is nothing to be played around with. Worshiping God is not some past-time that we entertain ourselves with every Sunday for an hour. It’s the most important thing that we do. The whole purpose of us being here, the point of us being created at all, is to glorify God and enjoy Him…and this purpose is wonderfully experienced when we come together on Sundays for worship.

Surely, if our worship is bringing God’s disapproval and curse we’re doing something wrong, just like the people of God in our passage. So we should all look carefully at how we approach God in worship to see if we’re neglecting worship outright: by missing Sunday services and by limiting God’s time to only one hour…or if we’re not approaching Him properly: by coming to Him without the fear and reverence that He deserves and by not preparing our hearts to come into His holy presence. There are many other ways in which we can abuse the worship of God, but this certainly gives us a place to start.

As we examine ourselves by the light of Scripture, we must be willing to change where we see ourselves straying from the standard that God requires of us. And we can only be conformed more to what God requires by the grace of Christ as He works in us by His Holy Spirit. It won’t do any good to try and change ourselves, but we must strive to change by God’s power.

So how, specifically, should our worship be corrected? We look at v.14 for one of the corrective measures:

14…For I am a great King, says the LORD of hosts, and my name will be feared among the nations.

Our perception of God must be right. We must see Him as a great king. Unlike our presidents who are up for election every 4 years, our God is a king and reigns forever. What God requires in our worship today He will require in our worship 100 years from now. There’s not going to be a change in policy as we see in our political system, but God is an unchanging and powerful king who exercises complete rule and dominion over everything.

God won’t be dismissed or placated. He’s a most terrifying God to those who are against Him, and a most satisfying God to those who are His…as He defends them and sustains them in all that they do. Look at how Psalm 2 describes those who would come against such a holy and powerful king…

Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed… He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision…(Psa 2:1-12 ESV)

And in the KJV we read of those who submit to God as their king as we read in Ps 89…

For thou art the glory of their strength: and in thy favour our horn shall be exalted. For the LORD is our defence; and the Holy One of Israel is our king. (Psa 89:17-18 KJV)

We are in one of the two camps. We either rage against God by worshiping Him in an unworthy manner, or we submit to His rule as king in our lives as we worship in a way that pleases Him rather than in a way that pleases us or the world around us.