Four hundred and fifty years before Jesus came on earth, the people of Israel were a special case. [Perhaps Israel always has been a special case?] They were God's special people - He would be their God, and they would be His people. But there were blips in the relationship.

Some hundred and fifty years before this point, their temple and their city had been destroyed and the people were taken prisoners, sent hundreds of miles away to live in Babylon. Clearly, the prophets told them, this was God's judgment on their failure to obey and trust him. Then they were sent back to their homeland by Cyrus, and a temple was rebuilt in Jerusalem. Great enthusiasm. Great rejoicing. More decades passed, and they were 'in the doldrums'. Ezra the scribe came to teach them the law of Moses all over again. Nehemiah, sent by the Persian emperor, had the city walls rebuilt and made them obey their distinctively Jewish laws. But for the priests and people it was a time of doubt, uncertainty and disillusion. If they were a special case among the peoples of the world, God's special people, why weren't things going better? Then to them came a Messenger.

The word Malachi means Messenger. We do not know if this was his personal name, or whether it was just the title given by those who later on preserved this prophecy. The important thing was the message, and this is very direct. Not until John the Baptist centuries later did anyone recorded in scripture again speak so directly to the people and the religious authorities in Israel. The Messenger took up the moans of a lax and dispirited people, and spoke God's answer.

Their first complaint was that if God loved His people, He had a funny way of showing it. What was the evidence for His love? The Messenger pointed to the condition of the neighbouring land of Edom. The Edomites, descended from Esau, had had their countryside laid waste, with no hope of rebuilding. The people of Judah, descended from Jacob, were rebuilding their nation. This reflected the situation of long ago, when Jacob's faithfulness to God brought him prosperity. The failure of Edom would be evidence of God's power beyond the borders of his own people. [It is an interesting question whether material prosperity is always proof of God's favour.]

The second protest was that the priests could not see how they were showing contempt for God's name, as they were accused of doing. They said they were obeying Him as their Father, their Master. But the Messenger was very bitter about this. The problem was that they did not honour God with their best - for a temple offering, any second rate carcase would do. The Messenger said it would be better to shut up shop and suspend the temple ritual than to carry on like this. Even foreigners knew how to worship God with proper respect. Such inferior offerings would bring a curse upon them, not a blessing. They would be turned out of the temple courts with ignominy. [Did Jesus remember this when he turned the traders out of the temple?]

The Messenger brought a reminder of the ancient covenant with Levi. The promise to Levi was life and peace, so that they might stand in awe of God's name. Levi (representing the original priests of that tribe) had kept the covenant, teaching the people to live uprightly and turning them from wickedness for he was God's messenger to them. But the Levites of their day taught people to do wrong, took bribes, showed partiality.

God is the Father, the Creator of them all. Why did they not keep faith with one another, members of His family, keep faith with their ancestors - for being God's family means family loyalty. It means not marrying foreign wives who have foreign gods. It precludes divorce. The family of faith can only continue if their children are brought up to worship and obey the true God. They complained that God did not accept their offerings. What more could they expect if this was the way they treated their wives, and were unfaithful to them, as they were unfaithful to God.

Even the people who thought of themselves as faithful came in for a rebuke. The Messenger told them that they were making God tired of them. And the point at issue was that they thought of Him as a moral relativist who did not care how they behaved. Either that, or He was missing. "Where is the God of justice?" they asked. Is He just as pleased with the evil as the good? Why doesn't he come and do something about it?

The reply: He is sending His advance messenger to prepare you. And the Lord will come suddenly to his temple. Watch out! It will not be pleasant. Like a refiner, He will melt out the wrong in you. The sons of Levi will be purified, so that they do their job properly and offer appropriate offerings to the Lord - just like it was in the old times. The following people will be judged:

(a) sorcerors
(b) adulterers
(c) false witnesses on oath
(d) capitalists who bear down on wage slaves, widows and orphans
(e) those who cheat immigrants of their rights, and do not fear God.

The Messenger reminded them that their national survival had depended on God keeping to His side of the Covenant. He is more than willing to have them back into the relationship if they will return to Him. "Return to Him - what do you mean?" Well, for one thing, you are robbing Him. "What do you mean, you can't rob God!" What about the tithes - the one tenth of all their produce set aside as food for the priests? Keep up to date with your tithes, says God, and then your crops will not fail and the nation will be eminently prosperous, to be admired by all around.

The Messenger had not finished yet. There was an opinion going around that there was no point in serving God. What was the use of keeping his laws, or being humble before Him if those who went their own sweet way could get away with anything? This opinion amounted to speaking against God.

Those who feared the Lord, on the other hand, kept in fellowship with one another, and the Lord took note of this fact. He promised that when He did act, he would protect them - they were His family. That would be the time when it would be very obvious who were righteous and who were wicked. The experience of the wicked would be like stubble being burned off a field: for the righteous it would be like young animals just let out into a field, jumping and leaping about, trampling on the burnt stubble.

The Messenger finished with a warning and a promise. God was going to act and the Jews should remember the law they had been given through Moses. And keep it. The promise was that they would have the prophet Elijah sent to them, who would reunite the nation - the riotous young and their uncaring elders - so that 'that day' would not be for them a disaster.

Four hundred and fifty years later, John the Baptist came to the nation, in the spirit and power of Elijah. He was more than a prophet, he came as the Messenger who would prepare the way. And the Lord came suddenly to his temple - Herod's magnificent temple - and was rejected by the people there. And another forty years on, the Roman legions brought disaster upon rebellious Jerusalem.