MALACHI SERIES 4: GOD’S SECOND AND THIRD CHARGES OF SIN (2:10-17)

I. GOD’S LOVE FOR JACOB (1:1-5)

II. GOD’S FIRST CHARGE OF SIN (1:6-2:9)

III. GOD’S SECOND AND THIRD CHARGES OF SIN (2:10-17)

A. THE PEOPLE’S SIN OF UNFAITHFULNESS TO

THE COVENANT (2:10-16)

1. The Sin of Unfaithfulness Revealed (v. 10)

a. Through the sin of mixed marriages (vv. 11-12)

Read Mal 2:11a.

~ Judah is held up as an example of this polluting betrayal.

~ The concern of this charge is the people’s unfaithful activity in their relationships with one another.

~ The treachery or unfaithfulness Malachi had in mind (v. 10) is

called an “abomination”.

~ An “abomination” is something abhorrent to God.

Read Mal 2:11b.

~ “profaned”: to defile, to desecrate, to violate.

~ And what did Judah profane? “The sanctuary of the Lord which

He loves.”

~ Whatever it was specifically, this abominable unfaithfulness

involved a profaning of holiness “which He (the Lord) loves.” And the abomination is: Mal 2:11c.

~ This phrase simply means intermarriage with pagans.

~ This verse speaks of second breach of Judah’s covenant with God: the

people had entered into mixed marriages.

~ GOD SAW ALL THIS AS ULTIMATELY UNFAITHFULNESS TO HIM, A TREACHERY AGAINST HIM.

Such marriages had been expressly forbidden because they would lead the people into idolatry and later to apostasy.

~ defeats God’s purpose of having made Israel His chosen people, to whom He would be the Father to the Israelites in a unique sense

Verses where we would read of this prohibition:

~ Ex 34:11-16

~ Deut 7:3-4

~ Josh 23:12-13 Intermarrying continued a big problem

after the return from the Exile, and such marriages had been reported in:

~ Ezra 9:2-6; 10:18-19

~ Neh 10:30 and 13:23-27

In the NT God has a command that is similar in nature to His prohibition to Israel through the apostle Paul in 2Cor 6:14-16.

~ An unequally yoked union with an unbeliever can draw a believer’s heart away from the Lord.

~ This kind of union will expose your life to an unbeliever’s values and influences, and these have a way of making an impact in your life one way or another.

~ How sad that many churches today do not take this NT command

seriously!

~ Many seem to think that this is just a “better option”, not a necessary requirement.

~ When we are emotionally moved and tempted to enter into prohibited

relationships like this, we must very deliberately choose to be truth- founded in dealing with those emotions.

Whereas Mal 2:11 contains God’s charge of sin, v. 12 declares God’s threat.

~ “man” – males

~ “the tents of Jacob” – a figurative expression for the community of Jews

~ “cut off from the tents of Jacob” – either that the man would die or that he and his line would be completely wiped out and exterminated and, thus, would have no descendants in Israel

~ “who awakes and answers” (NASB, literal)

~ general intent of the expression: the entirety of the transgressor’s family would suffer the “cutting off”

~ Being passive witnesses to sin does not absolve us from participation in it; there is a reason for God allowing us to sometimes witness the sins of fellow believers, and it is not to turn a blind eye but to be an instrument in addressing that sin to help bring about repentance.

The threat of being “cut off” extends also to the one “… who presents an offering to the Lord of hosts.”

~ Formal ritual activity and surface religiosity can never atone or make up for willing and flagrant disregard for God’s covenant and shameless disobedience to His laws.

~ What is truly needed is what God requires: TRUE AND PROFOUND CONFESSION OF AND

BROKENNESS OVER SIN.