1. "Waiting, my friends, is the basic posture of the Christian life, and waiting is a struggle. And the stakes are high. The difference between a good and a bad response to waiting is the difference between obedience and disobedience, between a faithful life and an unfaithful one, in some cases, between heaven and hell."

2. "Turns out these people didn't actually want God. They wanted the stuff that comes with God. Like the guy who pretends to fall in love with the heiress just to get the glamorous lifestyle that comes with her."

3. "Precisely because God loves you, he has designed it so that religion will not work. And so as your give-to-get religion disappoints, I pray it will push you to discover the surpassing worth of God himself."

4. "To fear God is to be in awe of him, it's to revere him. Though I think it's important to note the word the biblical authors use is not awe or reverence, it's fear. Because fear fills the mind, it excites the passions, it even touches the body."

5. "Your life was not built to be its own center of gravity. It was built to orbit around him."

6. "If you've ever thought about Christianity as a religion where we, the righteous, point fingers at the wicked out there, I would say you've not merely misunderstood our religion. You have it 180 degrees upside down. We are a religion of people who admit to being sinners."

7. "Hell is not the absence of God, it is the terrible presence of God in all of His justice, absent any cooling touch of His mercy."

8. "If you do not appreciate God's confident justice, then you will fail to grasp his lavish mercy, and you will not call him good in any way that he really is."

9. "So often, we can't see how we're supposed to get from here to where God is calling us to be, but we do know the next step. And faithfulness as a Christian is to take that next step, whatever it is."

10. "Have you labored like Elijah faithfully and seen no fruit? Have you prayed like that mighty man of God and seen no answer? Are you tired of waiting? Oh my friend, do not give up because God does not, will never give up on his dear servants."

Observation Questions

1. In Malachi 3:13-14, what specific accusations do God's people make against Him, and what words do they use to describe their service to God?

2. According to Malachi 3:16, how did "those who feared the Lord" respond, and what did God do in response to their actions?

3. What three things does God promise in Malachi 3:17 regarding those who fear Him and esteem His name?

4. In Malachi 4:1, what imagery does God use to describe what will happen to "the arrogant and all evildoers" on the coming day, and what will be left of them?

5. According to Malachi 4:2-3, what contrasting imagery describes what the day of the Lord will bring for "you who fear my name," and what will they be like?

6. In Malachi 4:5-6, who does God promise to send, what will this prophet accomplish, and what warning accompanies this promise?

Interpretation Questions

1. The people in Malachi 3:14 describe serving God as "walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts." What does this phrase reveal about their understanding of what it means to serve God, and how does this contrast with what the sermon describes as truly "fearing the Lord"?

2. In Malachi 3:17, God calls the repentant ones His "treasured possession"—a term previously used in Exodus 19:5 as conditional on obedience. How does the sermon explain this apparent tension, and what does this reveal about God's grace?

3. Why is the distinction between "the righteous and the wicked" in Malachi 3:18 not simply a division between moral people and immoral people? According to the sermon and the passage, what actually makes someone "righteous" in God's sight?

4. How does the imagery of the "sun of righteousness" rising with "healing in its wings" (Malachi 4:2) connect to the fire that destroys the wicked in verse 1? What determines whether God's coming brings destruction or healing?

5. The sermon connects Elijah's prayer at Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:37) asking God to "turn their hearts back" with God's promise to send Elijah in Malachi 4:5-6. What is the significance of God answering Elijah's prayer 900 years later through John the Baptist, and what does this teach us about God's faithfulness?

Application Questions

1. The sermon identifies that the Israelites "wanted the stuff that comes with God" rather than God Himself. In what specific areas of your life might you be more attracted to the benefits of Christianity (community, meaning, moral framework, comfort) than to knowing God Himself? What would it look like to reorient your desires this week?

2. Malachi 3:16 says those who feared the Lord "spoke with one another." How might intentionally speaking with other believers about your faith—especially during seasons of spiritual weariness or doubt—help you persevere in waiting on God? Who could you reach out to this week for this kind of conversation?

3. The sermon warns against "contractual religion" where we do things for God to get things from God. What specific expectations do you have of God right now that, if unmet, might cause you to feel cheated or to question whether serving Him is worthwhile? How does remembering God's past faithfulness address those expectations?

4. The passage promises that God will "spare" those who fear Him "as a man spares his son who serves him" (Malachi 3:17). How should this picture of God as a loving Father who delights to spare His children change the way you approach Him when you are struggling with sin, doubt, or weariness?

5. The sermon emphasizes that "waiting is the basic posture of the Christian life" and that faithfulness means taking "the next step" even when we cannot see the full path. What is one specific act of obedience you know God is calling you to take this week, even though you cannot see how it will lead to the outcome you hope for?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Psalm 73:1-28 — This psalm directly addresses the struggle of envying the wicked who prosper and records the psalmist's turning point when he entered God's sanctuary and understood their final end.

2. 1 Kings 18:30-39 — This passage recounts Elijah's prayer at Mount Carmel asking God to turn the people's hearts back, which the sermon identifies as the prayer God finally answers through John the Baptist.

3. Luke 1:13-17 — The angel Gabriel announces John the Baptist's birth and explicitly connects him to Malachi's prophecy about Elijah turning hearts of fathers to children.

4. Titus 2:11-14 — This passage explains how Jesus gave Himself to "purify for himself a people for his own possession," fulfilling the "treasured possession" language from Malachi 3:17.

5. Revelation 21:1-7 — This passage describes the ultimate fulfillment of God's promised future where He dwells with His people, wipes away every tear, and makes all things new—the hope that sustains believers who grow weary in waiting.

Sermon Main Topics

I. The Struggle of Waiting on God

II. Don't Grumble That God's Not Worth the Wait (Malachi 3:13-15)

III. Remember God's Present Mercies (Malachi 3:16-17)

IV. Remember God's Promised Future (Malachi 3:18-4:3)

V. Remember God's Past Provision (Malachi 4:4-6)

VI. God's Faithfulness to His Servants: The Elijah Connection

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Detailed Sermon Outline

As quite a number of you know, after our members meeting last Sunday, I am working right now to try to get a building permit so we can rehab the Fellowship Hall in the basement. This is a process I've been through maybe half a dozen times, the project's here and in my own house. And the other day, as I was just thinking through all the emotions I was feeling, I thought, gosh, this sounds, feels awful like the five stages of grieving, right? So first I have the shock and dismay at what's being asked of me, and then the guilt and pain I feel I hadn't thought about beforehand, then comes anger and bargaining, and of course in this process a lot of bargaining, despondence, and then eventually hope. Hope.

Those in the permit office, I found to be wonderfully kind and helpful, but the process itself, to quote Thomas Paine, these are the times that try men's souls. At least mine. Turns out I'm not very good at waiting. I don't think many of us are. Just look at traffic patterns around town and you'll see a bunch of people who are not very good at waiting.

I think the kids among us are not much better. But I have a friend who decided, somewhat in frustration, that she would legislate with her daughters that there would be no conversation about birthdays except the morning of the second Saturday of every month. Otherwise, the other 364 days would be full of conversation and about birthdays. Waiting is hard, isn't it?

And waiting for something that we really hope for is even harder. How many couples get into a fight just before they get engaged because he's nervous and acting weird and she's wondering if he's ever gonna ask? That's how one friend of mine ended up proposing through a locked bathroom door.

So it's no wonder that we struggle to wait for what God has for us. Now, for some of us, that's the legalistic give to get mentality we talked about last week. As in, I've done my part, God, now it's time for you to deliver. But even when our motivations are good, we can struggle to wait. We struggle to wait for healing, for example, especially when healing is so elusive.

For freedom from a particularly persistent sin. For assurance of salvation, for restoration of a relationship, God says you should ask.

God can provide what you ask. God could actually provide it this instant, and yet God delays and we struggle. Sometimes the root of that struggle is entirely righteous. I think about when Herb Carlson passed. This last year at 103, our oldest member, and in faith, Herb would wonder aloud why the Lord would keep him waiting.

Waiting, my friends, is the basic posture of the Christian life, and waiting is a struggle. And the stakes are high. The difference between a good and a bad response to waiting is the difference between obedience and disobedience, between a faithful life and an unfaithful one, in some cases, between heaven and hell.

So how will you respond when you struggle to wait on God? We're in our final sermon in Malachi today on page 802 of your Pew Bible. And in today's passage, it turns out God's people are not doing well in this struggle at all. And return to the land after 70 years of exile because of their sin and rebellion against God, the exile God had promised. And a thousand years earlier, God had also promised that after they'd been exiled for this disobedience, they would return, and he said that they would repent and that he would bless them with prosperity.

And as we saw last week, despite what they apparently thought was a good faith effort to clean up their act, their hearts were still far from God, and so the prosperity that God had promised remained elusive drought raging and crops failing, and these people had had enough. Their patience was wearing thin. Well, in his kindness, God addresses their concerns all through this book in a way that is really unparalleled in the Scriptures. God mercifully gives voice to their accusations against him.

Well, this morning we're looking at the last of these accusations. Chapter 3, verse 13 is where we begin. Maybe the most honest of their accusations, where they've gotten tired of waiting for God and they lament that serving him has been in vain.

But what follows that accusation is something entirely unexpected. In verses 16 to 17, it seems that some of these people reconsider, repent, and turn to God, and that God accepts them with open arms. Then starting in verse 18, God answers that accusation. The distinction between the righteous and the wicked, though hidden from view today, he says will one day pop into relief with consequences that are eternal. And then finally, chapter 4, verse 4, God gives his faithful ones their marching orders, so to speak.

For the 400 years of silence that will follow this book, silence that will end with a prophet clothed like Elijah, crying out in the desert, make straight the way of the Lord. Of the Lord as John introduces us to Jesus.

So what should you do when you become weary in waiting on God? Malachi is going to give us an answer to that question in four points. First, he's going to tell us what not to do. Grumble that God's not worth the wait. That's chapter 3 verses 13 to 15.

And then three points about what we should do. Remember God's present mercies, verses 16 and 17. Remember God's promised future, chapter 3, verses 18 to 4, verse 3. And our last point, remember God's past provision, chapter 4, verses 4 to 6. One point about what not to do, three points about what to do when we struggle, waiting on God.

So with that, let's get to our first point. About what not to do. Don't grumble that God's not worth the wait. Chapter 3:13, your words have been hard against me, says the Lord. But you say, How have we spoken against yout?

You have said, It is vain to serve God. What is the profit? Of our keeping his charge, or of walking as a mourning before the Lord of hosts. And now we call the arrogant blessed. Evildoers not only prosper, but they put God to the test and they escape.

As I mentioned, I think this is maybe the most honest of all those accusations against God that we see in the book of Malachi. This is the root cause, you might say, of all of their complaining against God.

They say, It's vain to serve God, verse 14, or more specifically, what is the profit, a word that normally describes in the Bible the spoil of battle, that is, what's in it for me of keeping his charge, obeying him, or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts, which I think is a remarkably cynical way to describe service to the King of kings. Like a spoiled child complaining to her dad, you never let me do anything. As far as these people were concerned, they'd done their part. God hadn't done his. They were done with him.

And so it says, They envy the arrogant and those who do evil, the arrogant, those opposed to God in their hearts, the evildoers, those opposed to God in their actions. A few of you this week have mentioned Psalm 73 to me where the psalmist is struggling with that same envy, right? If this is what I get for serving God, wouldn't I be better off without him? To whatever extent your heart's asking that same question, I think you might find Psalm 73 to be good reading this week, particularly the way it turns in verse 17.

Because at least implicitly, we often act as if it's vain to serve God. Right, every time you say, I'll serve God with my life, but hands off this part of it. Or when you feel despondence when following Christ doesn't work out the way you intended it to. When you grumble, when you complain, even some of us probably given a room this size considering walking away from the faith altogether. I mentioned that honesty is one of the Bible's great virtues.

I mentioned that last week. I think we see that again here. You're not going to find all the answers you want in the Bible. After all, how can you squeeze the infinite God into the confines of your human mind? But I'll tell you, the Bible does not hide from asking your questions.

And the honest question we get here is one that most of us are probably ashamed to even vocalize to God, even though we think it in our hearts. Is God really worth it?

Turns out these people didn't actually want God. They wanted the stuff that comes with God. Like the guy who pretends to fall in love with the heiress just to get the glamorous lifestyle that comes with her.

If you're here this morning as someone who's investigating Christianity, I hope you feel very welcome here. You don't have to pretend to be a Christian to be in this room. But I wonder, what so far is attractive to you about the Christian faith? Do you want to know God? Or are you more attracted by the stuff that comes with them?

Things like meaning and purpose and fulfillment and community? By God's grace, I've seen many people come to faith in this church over the years, and I can tell you that no matter what you want from him today, the place where you're gonna have to get to is where you understand that your greatest problem is not your loneliness or your meaninglessness, it's your sin. And the way it separates you from God, and your greatest desire is going to have to become not the stuff of God, but God himself. And if you're a Christian this morning, this is a danger for you also. Right?

Beware, my friends, of anything approaching a contractual religion where you do things for God to get things from God. That religion is not gonna work for you any more than it worked for these people in Malachi's day. In fact, precisely because God loves you, he has designed it so that religion will not work. And so as your give to get religion disappoints, I pray it will push you to discover the surpassing worth of God himself. That's one reason why we have a prayer of praise every Sunday morning.

Right, Thanksgiving is good. We also have a prayer of Thanksgiving. It focuses on the things God does for us, but praise is purely about who he is. And that prayer is designed to elevate our attention to focus on just God. This first point that Malachi gives us is important because sometimes the reason we struggle to wait is that we're waiting for the blessings of God rather than for God himself.

And so when God in love delays those blessings so we can know him more fully, we don't feel loved, we feel cheated. So, the first thing we need to take away from this passage is what not to do. But, of course, we need more than that, don't we? So, let's turn there to verse 16 in our second point, Remember God's present mercies.

Then those who feared the Lord spoke with one another. The Lord paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the Lord and esteemed his name.

They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts. In the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him.

It seems that some of God's people finally got it. Malachi has been speaking, prophesying, telling them of their sin, telling them to turn, And honestly, unlike many of the other prophets, some of them do. They feared the Lord, verse 16. They esteemed his name. And that's not because they were inherently righteous.

Far from it. They have sinned in all the ways that Malachi described so far in this book. But they have come to fear God and to esteem his name. Whereas the people in general in this book esteem prosperity, they esteem God.

Whereas the people in general despise God's name, they fear him. That phrase feared the Lord in verse 16 is probably one worthy of some additional explanation. Fearing the Lord is a matter of the heart, not of just behavior. Psalm 112 says, verse 1, Blessed is the man who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in his commandments. And fearing God is very different from being afraid of God.

Rather, to quote author Michael Reeves, it is a love that trembles because its object, the Lord, is overwhelmingly and incomparably beautiful, holy, and glorious. To fear God is to be in awe of him, it's to revere him. Though I think it's important to note the word the biblical authors use is not awe or reverence, it's fear.

Because fear fills the mind, it excites the passions, it even touches the body. And as I noted earlier from Psalm 112, fear is a deep joy. It's a delight. Fear of God takes in the awesome power and holiness of God and delights in it as a father does the strength of his as a child does the strength of her father because she knows she's secure in his love.

So like them, we are also to fear the Lord. We are to esteem his name. In one sense, that's been the whole book of Malachi. That's been his main objective. Live with God at the center of your life and not yourself, not your desires, not your needs.

Your life was not built to be its own center of gravity. It was built to orbit around him.

And that's the mindset we need to have when we struggle to wait on him.

My Christian brother and sister, do you esteem his name? When you're on the playground or on Facebook or in the workplace, do you esteem his name? I'm sure you've been driving before and you see someone with a fish decal on the back of their car driving rudely and you're really embarrassed for Jesus.

What if you had that fish decal on your back all the time? And what you do? I hope that your neighbors and your friends and your family and co-workers know that you're a Christian. What do you do with that attachment to his name?

Well, this is what our mindset needs to be. We need to fear him. We need to esteem his name. And when we do, when we go from being sinners like these people were to fearing remembering him, how does he respond? Well, these people repent, and it says God listens.

He has a book of remembrance written before him, which could be a picture of him remembering them. It could also be a picture, an image of what he gives so they would remember him, maybe even these words in Malachi. What this book is is not clear to us. What it means is very clear, verse 17, They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare as a man spares his son who serves him.

So three things we see here about God's response to faith and repentance. When we repent, his response is immediate, it's gracious, and it's generous. We see the immediacy of God's response, frankly, and how little these people actually do here. But there's no grand acts of penitence, there's no lengthy track record he's waiting for, they simply speak to one another, presumably of their newly kindled faith and fear in God, grasping and blindness after faith, so to speak. And God responds.

And his response is gracious. I think we see that especially in that term, my treasured possession in verse 17. That's a term that is used particularly in the books of Moses to describe God's people, but there, that's an honor that's contingent on their obedience. So Exodus 19:5, God says, Now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all the peoples. If you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, which is exactly what the people did not do.

That's the whole point of Malachi. And yet, God calls them his treasured possession. So if you're a good student of the Old Testament and you're here in Malachi, you're thinking, How can he do that? How can he change the rules like that? You would be grateful but also confused.

But we know the answer to that. Titus 2:14, Jesus gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession. Same word, different means. Jesus kept the covenant so we could be his treasured possession. That's what's underneath his words in Malachi, which of course is also what we see in that last phrase in verse 17, isn't it?

A man spares his son because he loves him, not because his son deserves to be spared. And so God, in love, in grace spares us a bit of the new covenant there breaking in in the old. Kids, I'm guessing this is an image you are very familiar with, right? Your parents spare you the consequences of your actions because they love you, right? They clean up the stuff you spill, they fix the stuff you break because they love you.

So how much more do you need God to spare you the consequences of your actions? Consequences that are far more significant and eternal? Or the image that comes to my mind is a bowling alley where the pinsetter lifts up the pins still standing before the other pins are swept away. But that's what God promises to do for His children on the day of judgment, not because they deserve it.

But as His gracious response to their faith. And we see that God's response here is generous. Right? This is no grudging God. Like the father of the prodigal who gets up and runs as soon as he sees his son in the distance, God delights to save us.

Is that your view of God? Or in your mind, is He more like some dowry-had-mistress-and-old-story-you-read-once just itching to get you out of line? But use these words to rehabilitate your view of God as a God who really does give generously and without reproach.

When we get weary in our waiting as Christians, this is the God we should remember, this God who responds immediately, graciously, generously, this God who acts immediately to even the leading shadow of our repentance. This God whose response is not merely unconditional but in so many ways, contrA-conditional, the opposite of what we deserve. And this God whose response is glorious in its generosity. Oh my friends, this is the God who keeps you waiting. Surely you can trust him.

But Malachi has more for us. Do you remember when we tire of waiting on God point three?

Remember God's promised future. And verse 18, then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him. For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch.

But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings; you shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.

But basically what we've seen so far in these verses, it seems that the distinction in verse 18 is a distinction within God's people. Right? Some in Judah are wicked, some are righteous. That is, in the way we've just seen in verses 16 and 17, not that they're sinless, but they repent of their sin and fear the Lord God, which is how God makes them his treasured possession. Not all the people of Israel, of Judah, but these people.

And though the consequences of being righteous or wicked seem muddled in the present, which is the source of the people's complaining, it will not be that way forever, because this verse says, A day is coming, burning like an oven, when the reality of things will become crystal clear.

And just as the oven hardens the clay, so on that day their estate will be hardened forever. Does this language of righteous and wicked make you uncomfortable?

You think, you, know, Jamie, life's not this black and white.

And I'm frankly a little concerned about anybody calling anybody wicked.

I mean, how many wars have been started by one leader cloaking himself in the label of righteous and branding his enemy as wicked? Present conflict in Ukraine included. I think you're right to be wary of this language, but let me offer you three thoughts on what we should do when God uses this language.

First, I think some of our aversion to labeling anybody as wicked stems from our privilege as those who have been spared grievous injustice. Those in this room who have not been spared that may not struggle as much with God saying he will judge the wicked.

Second, God making these declarations is very different from us making them. Right? So often in the name of not judging, we end up judging God the judge. I remember a little song from my kids used to watch Doc McStuffins when they were little. She's not bossy, she's the boss.

Right? He's not judgy, he's the judge. That's what he is to do. It is right for him to do that.

Third and most importantly, according to the Scripture, we've all acted wickedly and so we all deserve to be categorized as the wicked in these verses. That is, of course, the point of those verses we just discussed. If you've ever thought about Christianity as a religion where we, the righteous, point fingers at the wicked out there, well, I would say you've not merely misunderstood our religion. You have it 180 degrees upside down. We are a religion of people who admit to being sinners.

We have stopped exhausting ourselves trying to prove that we're okay before God, and instead we've come to confess that we're not.

In fact, there is only one man ever who deserved on his own merits to be called righteous, and that's Jesus. And through faith in him, faith that shows itself in repentance, as we just saw, we can be counted as righteous for his name's sake.

But the dreadful language here about the wicked is a fate you deserve. It's a fate I deserve. But my friend, it is not a fate you have to have because God graciously holds out the righteousness of Christ to be our own if we would confess our wickedness and turn to Him and trust Him in faith. I think our statement of faith that our church has been using since the 1870s is very useful in this regard. It says this: We believe that there is a radical and essential difference between the righteous and the wicked, that such only as through faith are justified, that is declared righteous, in the name of the Lord Jesus, sanctified, that is made holy by the Spirit of our God, are truly righteous in His esteem, while all such continue in impenitence, that is unrepentance, and unbelief are in his sight wicked and under the curse.

And this distinction holds among men both in and after death.

The people here in Malachi's day said, It didn't pay to be righteous. So God's not fair.

But there is a day coming when no one will be able to accuse God of injustice because his justice will be laid bare for all to see if there are any standing tall enough on that day to be able to see it. So let's look then through the eyes of the wicked and then the righteous as we try to grasp what this future holds. First, the wicked. Do you remember the arrogant and the evildoers from earlier in our passage whom the people called blessed? Well, they're not blessed now.

Verse 1 of chapter 4, They are stubble. The heat of God's justice has set them ablaze, and they are completely destroyed, leaving nothing. It says, Above the surface and nothing below. Who among the arrogant and evildoers in this city will be standing before God on that final day? What of all the things that we spend our lives pursuing will still be standing before God on that final day?

And, you know, unlike the fire we saw in Malachi 3 that purified, this is a fire of judgment, of destruction.

And one thing that's notable in this verse is that God is in no way a reluctant judge. Sometimes we Christians can describe God as if he's embarrassed about hell and wrath. Well, guys, I'm really sorry, but if I was going to be a good God, I had to be a just God. Kind of like the parental, this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you.

It is true God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked, Ezekiel 33. But the God of the Bible is in no way apologetic about his justice. He loves justice. Hell is not the absence of God, it is the terrible presence of God in all of His justice, absent any cooling touch of His mercy. Charles Spurgeon very famously put it this way: Hell trembles at Him.

The very howlings of lost spirits are but deep base notes of his praise. While in heaven the glorious notes shout forth his goodness, in hell the deep growlings resound his justice. Thus his empire is higher than the highest heaven and deeper than the lowest hell.

My friends, if you do not appreciate God's confident justice, then you will fail to grasp his lavish mercy, and you will not call him good in any way that he really is.

But God's promised future for those who fear his name is very different, isn't it? For you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall, and you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day day when I act, says the Lord of hosts. Oh my friends, these images are magnificent. Right, the heat of God's righteousness which sets the wicked ablaze is for those who fear God, the rising sun bringing healing in its wings.

The image of wings in the Old Testament is a rich one. God carries his people on his wings, Exodus 19. He shelters them under his wings, Psalm 91.

So the rays of a sun that could impart destruction in that hot climate are instead wings of healing. How much of this world needs healing? How much of your own heart and body and soul need healing?

How can God's righteousness as it rises bring healing for sinners instead of judgment? It's a bit like the riddle of 1 John 1:9, where John says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. And you have to think, how on earth did God's justice go from demanding my damnation to demanding my forgiveness?

It's because Jesus gave us his righteousness. He paid for our sin. It's amazing how much gospel truth there is right in this simple image. And we're not merely healed, it says, we're joyful. That's that next image, the calves coming out of the stall.

I didn't grow up with cattle, Jonathan Kiesling did. He tells me that every spring his dad would make sure he stood there as they released the bull calves from the stall where they'd been all winter because they were so happy, so joyful, so playful.

That's us! That's a picture of heaven. In that third image, the oppressors are ashes under our feet, not because we raised even a finger against them in revenge. No, because God has vindicated his servants at long last.

My friends, if you are in Christ, I want you to fix your gaze on this final day and drink deeply of the comfort that it offers. This last week there have been times when my own faith has felt stretched and thin. In this image, these images Malachi gives me have been such a balm to my soul. But no matter what you are struggling with today, there is coming a day when the sun will rise just like it did this morning, but it will rise and as its rays stretch out, they will illumine a world made new, a world that is that is healed, a world that's been healed from the inside out of all strife and corruption and confusion and oppression of every tear and every disappointment of every fear and loss. Revelation 21 that Welton read to us a bit from earlier.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

Amen. That's our hope, brothers and sisters. That's our hope. The problems we face in this life, if we are Christians, are temporary. Our hope is forever.

So what do we do this day with God's promise of that day?

Will we repent? Right, that the rising of God's righteousness might be healing and not condemnation. We tell others of that last day so that they might live in healing and joy that God offers. We breathe deeply of this comfort knowing that this sun of righteousness is going to rise just as surely as the sun rose for us this morning.

And would any sermon series at Capitol Hill Baptist Church be complete without some emphasis about church membership? Membership is the preparatory marking out of those who are righteous in God's sight from those who are not. Like the chalk lines in the fabric before you cut it forever. Doesn't mean churches don't make mistakes. They do.

But why would you risk your eternal soul on the rigor of your own self-perception?

True Christians cannot lose their salvation, but not everyone who thinks they're a Christian really is.

So if you consider yourself a Christian, you need to join a church. Right? A pilot doesn't fly blind down the Potomac River, eyes closed, just hoping at night that he'll land on the runway. No, those lights, those leading lights that you see on the Jodie B. Parkway are guiding him in. Right?

Let a local church be those lights, mercifully telling you if you're on course, before you wind up in the river. So when we're tired of waiting on God, we can fix our eyes on His promised future. We will not wait forever, my brothers and sisters, but also we see there point number four, He calls us back to look at what He's already done. Remember, God's past provision. We'll read starting in verse 4.

Remember the law of my servant Moses, the statutes and rules that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction. In these three verses I mentioned earlier, God is essentially giving his people their marching orders. For the 400 years they will wait until he speaks again.

And he describes one event in the past, the giving of the law at Mount Sinai, or Horeb as it's called here, and one event that for them is in the future, but for us as in the past, a prophet who would come in the spirit and power of Elijah, as we heard in that reading earlier that Miriam gave us in Luke chapter 1, John the Baptist, or more fully, the ministry of Jesus that was inaugurated by John. So from our perspective, we can look back at both of these events to remember God's past provision. And that word remember is an interesting one in verse 4. Normally in Scripture, God's people are called to keep the law or to obey the law. Here they're told to remember.

That's, I think, because these people have so corrupted the law that they can think they're obeying when in fact they're disobeying. God tells them to remember, right? Remember the law as it was really given, not the farce that you've made of it. Similarly, if you're here today and you think you're okay with God just 'cause you're a pretty good person, at least better than that person over there, don't take my word for it. Just flip three pages to the right where you'll find Jesus' Sermon on the Mount that we've been looking at on Wednesday nights.

I'd encourage you to take this Bible home if you don't have one and just read those three chapters this afternoon, Matthew 5, 6, and 7, and see if Jesus' words can help to clarify your own perception of yourself.

So, their marching orders were to go back to the basics and follow God's law. What does that mean for us?

Well, like them, when we tire of waiting, we also need to continue on in obedience to God. So often, we can't see how we're supposed to get from here to where God is calling us to be, but we do know the next step.

And faithfulness as a Christian is to take that next step, whatever it is. But unlike these people, our obedience has a lot more behind it. In short, we can obey because Jesus obeyed. Right, he is the one, the only one who ever remembered the law of Moses perfectly and obeyed it. He obeyed it perfectly in the place of all those who would ever put their faith in him.

And so he earned for us all of God's covenant blessings that were contingent on them keeping the covenant. So whereas these people, it seems, are trying to obey God out of desperation, we can obey out of fullness and gratitude for all that Christ has done for us. And beyond that, one of the blessings his obedience earned for us was the dwelling of his Spirit, making obedience to God's law finally possible for those who believe. So we can obey because Jesus obeyed.

Yet if Malachi finished there in verse 4, it would be tragic because if a thousand years of Israel's history had taught them anything, it's that they couldn't obey. They couldn't keep the law generation after generation from judges to Samuel to kings. They'd failed. Which is why I think verse 5 is so crucial for them and for us. God will send his prophet Elijah to turn the hearts of the people because that's what they needed.

There is so much grace and mercy bound up in that word before in verse 5. The day of the Lord is coming, the great and awesome day, and they cannot endure when it comes, but before it comes, Elijah will come. And he will turn their hearts so they will be the people of verse 17 who by grace become his treasured possession. And that's what we need too, isn't it?

We need God to turn our hearts. I hope that gives you compassion for those who are stuck in sin. What they need is not greater self-discipline or moral virtue. They need God to turn their hearts. And when he does, what's the result?

Verse 6, I think it's a little cryptic. Turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, the hearts of children to their fathers. Okay, Father has been used in the book of Malachi so far to describe God, but that would be the singular, not the plural. Fathers, plural, has been used to describe the patriarchs, but that would be the fathers, which is not what Malachi writes here.

What's he talking about? I think it's best to think of this as the final breaking of the solid area of sin between the generations of God's people which has characterized Israel up until now. Fathers will finally keep the covenant in a way that blesses their children, and children will keep covenant in a way that blesses their fathers. Right, this is the good result of God at long last turning the hearts of his people back to himself. And the words he uses here, I think, are a reminder to us that God honoring families are perhaps the greatest missions force this world has ever seen.

And then there's that somber and sour note our passage ends on.

That the book of Malachi ends on. That in our Bibles, the whole Old Testament ends on.

Lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction. You think, well, Malachi, that's a happy way to finish. But that phrase, decree of utter destruction, sounds a little odd to us. It would have been clear and very ominous to them. It's the word that God used when he announced that the Canaanite cities like Jericho would be devoted to destruction.

Unless their hearts are turned, God's people Israel will suffer the same fate as the wicked Canaanites had so many centuries before.

So how did this play out?

Well, John did come in the spirit and power of Elijah, in the gospel writers chronicle how the leaders rejected John. And then they rejected and killed the one he announced, the Lord of glory himself, even when he came to his temple as Malachi Malachi 3 had foretold. So it's hard not to see the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. destroying the temple, never to be rebuilt, as a partial fulfillment of Malachi 4:6.

But that wasn't all that happened with Jesus' ministry, because many did repent. Some of the descendants of Malachi's audience first and eventually descendants of every nation, just as Malachi had foretold in Malachi 1:11, and what happened to this curse for them? Jesus took it on himself. Right, he took the curse that our sins had earned. The curse that was pronounced at the very beginning of the Bible in Genesis 3, the curse that remains here at the end of the Old Testament, and as the New Testament comes to its completion of the book of Revelation, we stand in very much the same position as these people did at the end of Malachi.

We also are awaiting the one promised by Elijah, not for his first coming, but for his second, the coming described here in Malachi chapter four. As we read the ending words of the book of Revelation, we realize that curse is still very much a possibility, and yet it is a curse swallowed by Christ for all who repent and believe the good news. So we have a clarity of God's provision that goes far beyond what these people ever had. I appreciate how one author described it. The warning that ends the Old Testament is not absent at the end of the New, but the difference is that grace has the last words.

Just read those last words of Revelation this afternoon. Grace has the last word. So put yourself in these people's shoes for a moment. They are sick and tired of waiting for God to make good on His promises.

But for us on this side of Christ, we can see how God was faithful to everything He said He was going to do through the death, resurrection, life, enthronement of Jesus Christ.

In verse 4, I said, We can obey because He obeyed. I think a good summary of verses 5 and 6 from our perspective is that when we grow tired of waiting, we can be faithful because he was faithful. That is, we can be faithful in our waiting because we can see how he was faithful in the past to keep his promises.

So when you tired of waiting, my friend, look back to the provision of God that's promised here, the provision that resolve the accusations these people had in both grace and justice far beyond what they could have envisioned. Oh, my friends, God has been faithful for, and that means he will be faithful again. And with that, we should conclude.

There's one question in this passage we haven't yet addressed.

Why Elijah? Of all the Old Testament prophets, why will God's turning the hearts of his people begin with the second Elijah? I think the key there is that reference to Mount Horeb in verse 4. But to understand why that's the key, we need a bit of context. The prophet Elijah in the Old Testament is famous for something that happened on another mountain, Mount Carmel.

In 1 Kings 18, Elijah sets up a divine duel between the God of Israel and Baal, the false god. Two altars are built, two sacrifices laid, and each side is to call down fire from heaven from his god to see who will answer who is the real God of Israel. And Elijah prayed something very significant.

He prays this, O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. Answer me, O Lord, answer me that this people may know that you, O Lord, our God, and that yout have turned their hearts back.

You see, from the days of Moses, God had promised severe consequences if his people turned away from him, and so he had implored them not to, but he had also promised that one day he himself himself would turn their hearts back in a way they never could.

Elijah says, Lord, answer my prayer so this would be that day. And God does answer Elijah's prayer. Almost.

Fire falls from heaven and consumes the sacrifices and even the stones on the altar. The people fall on their faces proclaiming, the Lord, Yahweh, he is God. Elijah is vindicated as God's servant. All of Elijah's prayer is answered except those last seven words that you have turned their hearts back. Because by the next chapter, Elijah is running for his life.

He is depressed and despondent. He asks if he could die because even after this stunning miracle, the people's hearts are still turned against their God So where does Elijah go? He travels 40 days and 40 nights, no significance lost, to Horeb, the mountain of God.

Elijah's people have betrayed God's covenant, and so he goes back to where that covenant was first given, agonizing over why. He says, Lord, they have forsaken your covenant. O Lord, would you not answer my prayer? Would you not now turn their hearts back? Where is your grace that you promised at Mount Horeb?

But the instructions God gives Elijah at Horeb merely reinforce the covenant's consequences. His answer to Elijah is more judgment and a replacement for Elijah. Elijah's time as a prophet is now done.

So why would John come in the spirit and power of Elijah?

Well, my brothers and sisters, because God is finally answering that man's prayer. It's not this day, it's 900 years too late for that. But God has not forgotten his servant. He has not forgotten his servant's plea. My friends, God does not forget his faithful servants.

We may grow tired and grow weary. Our hearts may fail. Our hope may waste away from waiting. But he is always right on time. Have you labored like Elijah faithfully and seen no fruit?

Have you prayed like that mighty man of God and seen no answer? Are you like that faithful servant near the end of your faith and considering giving up?

Are you tired of waiting?

Oh my friend, do not give up because God does not, will never give up on his dear servants.

So who is it who gets to stand on top of that Mount of Transfiguration with the very one John the Baptist had announced? Who has granted the privilege of seeing with his own eyes the consolation of Israel, the one through whom God would turn hearts back to himself.

The two men of Horeb, Moses and Elijah, the Lord will never forget his servants, so you can wait patiently obediently, joyfully, as He's got you. Let's pray.

Oh Father, there are no doubt people in this room who are feeling weary in their faith like nothing I have described in the sermon. Oh, would you give them what they need? There are those of us who are not feeling that way today, but we will, maybe sooner than we expect. Would you give us what we need? Would you give us faith that comes as we look back, as we look to you, as we look to your promises in the future that we may be faithful and that you may be glorified.

We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.