MALACHI 1 (FROM CAC'S NOTEBOOK)
MALACHI 1 (FROM CAC’S NOTEBOOK)
It is to be noted that Malachi’s word is to Israel (chapter 1: 1), showing that in the mind of God His people are one whole at the end of the dispensation as they were at the beginning (chapter 4: 4). However small things may be and however corrupt, the people are addressed as “Israel”. They have that place in the mind of God. In the New Testament, the assemblies in Corinth and Galatia, and the seven assemblies, God does not release any one from assembly responsibility: “All the assemblies shall know” (Revelation 2: 23). “In the assembly”. God will not give up His sovereign ordering of the assembly in virtue of the presence of the Spirit, and God does not sanction any human arrangements which are inconsistent with it. God does not recognise anything but the assembly.
It is surprising to us that the first thing Jehovah says is, “I have loved you”. That is a matter of divine sovereignty.
[p. 567] He was going to deal with a most obdurate state of heart and departure of all kinds. But He begins with “I have loved you”. Esau the despiser comes under judgment, but Jacob is loved. It is a question of God’s election and calling. God has been pleased to call certain persons and to put them in His assembly. It is a fixed position and that is to determine all the conduct of the saints. All response depends on known relationships: our relationships as saints are fixed and unalterable: we have now to be true to these. God has loved us sovereignly and put us in certain relations. Then He may have to chasten us and admonish us and teach us to bring us into correspondence with the relations in which He has set us. How we have to do with God brings to light our true condition.
So we see here that the divinely established relations were not answered to. They were all established in sovereign love; then how sorrowful it is if they are not answered to. This is opened out in verses 6 - 10, and we find that the priests are the chief offenders. They despise Jehovah’s name in offering polluted bread on His altar.
The offering service comes first in the mind of God (Leviticus 1: 1). The first thing is what is due to God, “My bread” (Numbers 28). Something was brought before God which is unworthy of Him, something which is not Christ: blind, lame and sick do not speak of Christ; they speak of man’s selfishness and contempt of God. What the worshipper is comes out in what he offers: the “blind” refers to what is unintelligent, God has no pleasure in it. The lame and the sick speak of defects in the state of soul: they show that the offerer is wrong himself. We cannot offer beyond our own state of soul. If a brother is not walking well it is very important that others should make straight paths for their feet that the lame one may not be turned out of the way (Hebrews 12: 13). People who are lame and sick cannot offer beyond their own state of soul.
In chapter 3 God has to rebuke those who did not bring the tithes, but in chapter 1 He rebukes those who would not do anything unless they were paid. “All seek their own things” (Philippians 2: 21).
But verse 11 gives the true thought: it seems almost intended to apply to the local assembly — God’s name great, incense and a pure oblation. We see from chapter 3 that this involves refining: there cannot be a pure oblation apart from the purifying of those who offer. The true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth, the living water taking the place of corrupted inward springs. We know the character of what springs up naturally.