Malachi, the final of our Minor Prophets and the final book of the Old Testament, addresses Jerusalem at a time when the temple has been rebuilt as Haggai initially sought out. The priesthood is back in full swing and the temple has once again become the center of Jerusalem’s religious life. But there’s a problem: the priesthood is doing a pretty bad job. Under the priests’ leadership, the Israelites’ worship is lazy and indifferent, their sacrifices and prayers devoid of heart and honesty. That would be bad enough on its own, but to make things even worse, the priests are completely oblivious to how bad things are.
Malachi proceeds almost like a trial. There is accusation and defense. “I have loved you, says the LORD. But you say, ‘How have you loved us?’” “You have wearied the LORD with your words, says the LORD. Yet you say, ‘How have we wearied him?’” “Return to me and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. But you say, ‘How shall we return?’” In response to everything God says is going wrong, the priests simply wonder out loud how anything could be wrong. Haven’t they already returned to God?
As always, the prophet has good news to counter such bad news. God will cleanse and purify. Like a fire that burns away impurities, God will take what his people have to offer him in worship and not simply decide to accept it as is, but to utterly transform in the first place the human heart that offers up prayer and worship. Everything offered up from the human heart to God will be offered “in righteousness” and “will be pleasing to the LORD.” (Malachi 3:1-4) And this purifying work begins with a “messenger” character. Before God’s own sudden appearance, the messenger will come ahead and get things started.
Good news, right? Yes, but Malachi also asks a question: “Who can endure the day of his coming?” This messenger will begin God’s transforming work in us, but that’s not to say it will all go smoothly. In Luke 3, just before introducing us to the wilderness ministry of John the Baptist, Luke takes a moment to tell us who the world leaders are at the time. He tells us who is emperor, who is high priest, and a host of regional governors throughout Israel. These are the powerful and influential, the decision makers, the leaders who promise to make things better in the world. “And the word of God came to John in the wilderness.” (Luke 3:1-2) The word of God did not come to someone we look up to, not to anyone we voted into office, not to any public intellectual or best-selling author. The word of God came to the desert, to an eccentric hermit whose diet consists mainly of bugs and who makes his clothing out of whatever camel hair he can get his hands on. He is the one to go before Jesus and prepare the way, to start Jesus’ transforming work ahead of time.
John and Malachi get us to ask, are we actually ready to meet whatever messenger God will place in our path? Are we willing to look beyond the conventional leaders and hear the subversive voices in subversive places that we may not warm up to all at once? God is busy with the work of transforming the human heart to lift up something beautiful to him. And God is sending all manner of messengers into our lives to prepare us to encounter Jesus more and more directly. Are we willing to meet and hear out these messengers? Who can endure it?
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