SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/3/2016 9:00 PM
My Worship Time Focus:
The Complainers
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: Malachi 3:13-15
Message of the verses: “13 "Your words have been arrogant
against Me," says the LORD. "Yet you say, ’What have we spoken
against You?’ 14 “You have said, ’It is vain to serve God; and what profit is
it that we have kept His charge, and that we have walked in mourning before the
LORD of hosts? 15 ’So now we call the arrogant blessed; not only are the doers
of wickedness built up but they also test God and escape.’”
Well we
head into the last part of the book of Malachi as we follow Dr. Warren Wiersbe
outline in his commentary we find that his last main point in Malachi is
entitled “Despising God’s Service” and it covers chapter 3:12-4:6. I will quote the very short paragraph that he
wrote to introduce this last main point:
“This is the sixth and last of Malachi’s accusations: ‘You have said harsh things against Me,’ says
the Lord’ (3:13 NIV). As he closes his
book, he points out four different groups of people and what they said and did.” We look at the “Complainers” in our SD this
evening as they are the first group of people.
As I read
over these verses they remind me of a certain political party that is in our
country who have done similar and even worse things in our country.
I once
heard a preacher talk about what some people have said of what they though
heaven was like. They said that they did
not want to go to heaven if all they had to do was sit on a cloud and play a
harp. We would rather go into hell than
do that. Well as a person comes to know
the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord and then begins the sanctification process
which will cause them to fall in love with the God of heaven, the Lord of glory
they will not be bored in serving Him as these Jewish people did in Malachi’s
day as we see from verse 14.
I have
mentioned that leaders who are not leading in the way that God desires them to
lead will cause those under them to follow their wrong leadership and since the
priests who were leaders were a part of this the common people follow their bad
leadership. As I said similar things are
happen in the political realm of our country.
Dr. Wiersbe
writes “I hear this complaint from some believers about their churches. ‘We’re not getting anything out of this!’ But a church is like a bank or a home: you
don’t get anything out of it unless you put something into it. We serve God because it’s the right thing to
do, not because we’re rewarded for our service.
(We shall be rewarded, but that’s not our main motive.)”
The Jews
were also complaining that the pagan people (Non Jews) were being bless by God
more than they were. Now this may have
been true and if it were there were some reasons why it was true. The Jews had a covenant with the Lord found
in Deut. 28 and Lev. 36 that said if they obeyed the Lord they would be
blessed, and if they did not they would not be blessed, even cursed, so that is
one reason. No if you think about it in
the church age when we are not under that covenant then even though we’re
following the Lord bad things can happen to us.
I heard a pastor say that God gives the pagans some blessings in this
live as they won’t get any in the next life.
Perhaps there is truth in that statement. Jesus Christ is our example as He was perfect
and look what mankind did to Him, now I know that God was the one who orchestrated
all of this but man was still responsible for it as Peter tells us “(Ac 4:10) let it be known to all of you and to all the
people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you
crucified, whom God raised from the dead-by this name this man stands here
before you in good health.” We see that
Jesus Christ was indeed crucified and was treated very badly and yet after His
resurrection He would return to glory to be with the Father.
Jesus
Christ is our example of serving God as found in Philippians 2:1-13 and we will
close with those verses: “1 Therefore if
there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if
there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, 2 make my joy complete by being of the same
mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. 3 Do
nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one
another as more important than yourselves; 4 do not merely look out for your
own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. 5 Have this
attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, although He
existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be
grasped, 7 but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being
made in the likeness of men. 8 Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled
Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9
For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name
which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW,
of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every
tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
“12 So then, my
beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now
much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13
for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”
12/3/2016 9:27 PM
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