Malachi 1:12-13

This was given centuries after the consecration in Leviticus 8. It was even after Judah had been chastened through captivity and then returned to the Land of Promise. The priesthood at this time was in a state of decay, and God’s controversy has to do with the priests’ approach to the offerings. They were not giving the best they had, but instead they were doing what they thought they could get away with. As it says, they considered God’s table, His altar, to be contemptible.

There are things here for us to watch out for because our priesthood is of greater importance and a higher caliber than the Leviticus priesthood. These warnings may not apply in their letter since we do not literally cut up animals and hoist them onto an altar. But where human nature still reigns in us, this same approach may be found.

The attitude that God takes them to task for is considering His service to be a weariness or drudgery. Service was a burden and they were tired of it. Maybe the priests did not say this out loud, but their attitudes and actions spoke for them, like with the Laodiceans. The picture is of servants who do not regard it a privilege or a blessing to serve the Creator God. Their preferences and priorities were geared elsewhere, and service to God and His people was a burden that was keeping them from having the life they wanted.

Our priesthood responsibility is covered by Christ’s words about denying ourselves, taking up our cross daily, and following Him (Matthew 10:38-39; Luke 9:23-24). We have been called to whatever service He sets before us. There will always be an aspect of self-denial in serving, and the role of a priest exemplifies that.

The Levitical priests were born into their role. We have a choice as to whether we enter this priesthood. But once we accept His blood, we also accept everything that goes with it, including priesthood responsibilities that may feel wearisome and a burden if our focus is under the sun.

The priests here also said in some way—perhaps with their conduct, or maybe just in their minds—that God’s table was contemptible. There are two ways we can apply this. One is a despising of what we put onto God’s table, meaning our spiritual sacrifices and offerings. This can happen when we disconnect what we do from the One to whom we owe our lives. When our focus and priorities drift from God to material concerns, then our spiritual sacrifices are not done with the same care, and we begin to give God less than He is due. We begin to devalue His portion of our lives in favor of what we want from life.

A second way we can call God’s table contemptible is less obvious in this chapter, but it fits into our overall theme today. After God eats from His table, He shares with His priests, and they eat from His table. In this scenario, calling God’s table contemptible means despising or even rejecting the food—the spiritual food—that He offers to us from this table that hardly anybody has a right to eat from.

In practical application, this looks like neglecting Bible study, or just going through the motions without consciously taking in and applying the words of life that our consecrated ears have been gifted to be able to receive.

This is especially challenging today, when there is an all-out assault on our attention from the time we wake up until we go to sleep. Today, the word of God must compete with best-sellers and podcasts and feeds and more channels and information sources than can be counted. But none of those things will yield the abundant life that only comes from the Good Shepherd. He tells us not to strive for the food that perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which He will give us.

So, it’s worth contemplating how often God’s word loses this competition in the arena of our lives. Without prioritizing God’s table and His life-giving food, we simply won’t have the spiritual strength and energy to steadily walk the narrow and difficult way that leads to … . . .

Malachi 1:9-13

The answer is not given, but the answer is obvious: No, he would not accept that.

Can you see the halfhearted service, the halfhearted obedience, the profaning that was going on here? Not directly regarding the Sabbath, but in principle it was involved in here. The sacrifices that were coming to God were being done in a way that was not acceptable to Him.

There is no indication that what these people were doing was deliberate, that it was not a reasoned conclusion that it should be done this way. They didn't really (let's say) want to worship God this way. It wasn't in their heart to do it! But it was nonetheless being done that way. They were treating God as though He and the things of the altar—the service of the altar, and the sacrifice of the altar—were less important than other things. So, the way they did the ritual showed that—in their hearts—they considered it a secondary matter. Other things were squeezing out what should have been their first priority.

Malachi 1:6-14

These verses very clearly spell out that God is not at all pleased when His people defile the very special relationship He has established with them by means of careless, corrupted, polluted, defective, unacceptable offerings that do not meet His standards. Again I ask you: Do you honestly think that Joshua would ignore those instructions?