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MALACHI 3:6-18

6 “I the LORD do not change. So

you, the descendants of Jacob, are

not destroyed. 7 Ever since the time

of your ancestors you have turned

away from my decrees and have not

kept them. Return to me,

MALACHI 3:6-18

and I will return to you,”says

the LORD Almighty.

“But you ask, ‘How are we to

return?’ 8 “Will a mere mortal

rob God? Yet you rob me.

MALACHI 3:6-18

“But you ask, ‘How are we robbing

you?’ “In tithes and offerings.9 You are under a curse—your whole

nation—because you are robbing

me.

MALACHI 3:6-18

10 Bring the whole tithe into the

storehouse, that there may be food

in my house. Test me in this,” says

the LORD Almighty, “and see if I

will not throw open the

floodgates of heaven and pour out

MALACHI 3:6-18

so much blessing that there will not

be room enough to store it. 11 I will

prevent pests from devouring your

crops, and the vines in your fields

will not drop their fruit before it is

ripe,” says the LORD Almighty.

MALACHI 3:6-18

12 “Then all the nations will call you

blessed, for yours will be a delightful

land,” says the LORD Almighty.13 “You have spoken

arrogantly against me,” says

the LORD. “Yet you ask,

MALACHI 3:6-18

‘What have we said against you?’14 “You have said, ‘It is futile to

serve God. What do we gain by

carrying out his requirements and

going about like mourners before

the LORD Almighty?

MALACHI 3:6-18

15 But now we call the

arrogant blessed. Certainly

evildoers prosper, and even when

they put God to the test, they get

away with it.’” 16 Then those who

feared the LORD talked

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with each other, and

the LORD listened and heard. A

scroll of remembrance was written

in his presence concerning those

who feared the LORD and honored

his name.

MALACHI 3:6-18

17 “On the day when I act,” says

the LORD Almighty, “they will be

my treasured possession. I will

spare them, just as a father has

compassion and spares his son who

serves him.

MALACHI 3:6-18

18 And you will again see the

distinction between the

righteous and the wicked, between

those who serve God and those who

do not.

It’s real timely because we’re at that

time of year when people are giving

and receiving gifts, generosity tends

to increase.

This is the season where we start

anticipating and preparing for our

budget next year and how we will

steward what God has entrusted to

our oversight.

They fundamentally disagree with

God. God says do this; they don’t

want to. God says this is right; they

say it’s wrong. They’re in a position

of disagreeing with God.

Here’s what God says, “I don’t

change.” What that means is they

need to change, and we are no

different.

When we talk of God, we talk of his

attributes. Here we see a clear

declaration of his immutability,

which means that God is

unchanging.

And this is absolutely essential: God

does not change—we must change.

We cannot remain unchanged and

demand that God change.

God has no sin.

God makes no mistakes. God has

nothing to learn. God has no way to

mature. There’s nothing in God that

should change. There’s everything in

us that must change. And praise God

that he’s unchanging.

SPIRITUALITY says God is not a

person but more of a concept, and

God is not unchanging but is

changing. So God evolves and

morphs depending upon what

culture or period God is in.

Or God used to say that this is

wrong, but now that culture has gone

into a different understanding, God

needs to catch up with the times,

modify himself, edit the Scriptures,

and make some adjustments so that

God can be current.

God’s not current; God’s eternal.

God doesn’t need to change; we

need to change. God doesn’t change

with the times; God’s working on

change all the time.

There’s an analogy in Scripture that’s

frequently used: it’s of a potter and

clay.

God says something to one person

or one group of people, but it’s a

special circumstance, not everybody

gets that.

God does something that applies to

everywhere, everyone, all the time.

Jesus died on the cross in your place

for your sins. If you turn from sin

and trust in him, all your sin is

forgiven and you’ll be with him

forever.

That’s for everybody. That’s not just

for one person or one group of

people, that’s God dying on the cross

for the sin of the world. That’s a

miraculous thing for everyone,

everywhere, all the time.

Here’s the situation, there’s a

problem. The problem is they’re

robbing God. That’s what it says.

Now, they don’t feel like they’re

robbing God, but God feels like

they’re robbing God, so this is where

they have the disagreement.

God sees himself as part owner.

So the solution is, bring the ‘full

tithe,’ and I’ll pour down a blessing

from heaven.”

Now, the full tithe here is the full 10

percent. Make up on all your giving,

catch up. Give what you were

supposed to give, and what’ll happen

is, a blessing will come down from

heaven. He said that literally it would

flood down from heaven.

All the blessings come down from

heaven. See, they would have

thought that their blessings were

coming from their business, coming

from the earth, that their blessings

literally are coming from the ground

up, from the harvest of their soil.

God says, “blessings don’t come

from creation up. Blessings come

from Creator down.” Ultimately all

blessing comes down from God to

his people.

The problem is they’re stealing.

The answer is they need to stop

stealing and start giving.

We believe very clearly that this is

not an all-time promise.

It’s a one-time promise.

God promised something very

specific, and it’s not like this all the

time, otherwise the offering becomes

an ATM.

Our fear again is we give to get. We

shouldn’t feed greed. Jesus says,

“You can’t worship God and

money.”

And when it’s taught like this, my

fear is you’re not loving God, you’re

loving money and using God to get

more money. And then the heart is

wrong. The motive is wrong. The

intent is wrong.

God said, “Give and I’ll bless you,

but I will not tell you, give to get.”

So what does this section of

Scripture have for us? We think now

we’re in category three.

It’s a one-time promise with all-time

principles.

This was God’s interaction with his

people, and there’s a promise there

and for us, there are principles there.

A PROMISE is

“It will come to pass just like this.”

A PRINCIPLE is,

“This is usually how it works.”

Principles are about wise living,

cause and effect, how things tend to

work according to how God has

wired the world.

They don’t appreciate the generosity

of God. They’re looking at what they

don’t have, not what they do have.

They’re not looking at their business

income, they’re looking at how they

wish their business income was

higher, so there’s not an attitude of

gratitude.

But God is generous. He’s given

them life and love. He says he’s their

Father. He’s provided the land. He

has provided an income. Maybe it’s

not what they wanted, but it’s

certainly a lot better than they

deserve. God is generous.

God gave us the earth. God made us

in his image and likeness. God gave

us the Lord Jesus Christ. God gave

us the Holy Spirit. God gave us

forgiveness of sin. God gave us

righteousness. God gave us eternal

life.

God gave us gifts to serve

meaningfully and valuably and

purposefully. God’s a giver. God so

loved the world that he gave his only

Son. God’s generous. We start there.

What happens is people get more

excited about bringing God their

worst than their best.

God wants our worst and God wants

our best. And God gives Jesus, God

gives his best.

Who you are is most clearly seen in

how you spend. The difference

between a spoken value and an

actual value is the action around it.

If we look at your budget and a

percentage goes to the Lord, that

tells us something about your

relationship with the Lord.

Faith is a devotion to God in here

that results in a changed life out

there. So James says, “You can’t

have faith for God in here and not

change life out there.”

You can’t say you love God in here,

but it doesn’t affect how you spend

out there because out of the overflow

of the heart, the wallet spends.

Obey God, start loving, and serving

one another, doing what God says,

and see if that doesn’t start a process

of change in your heart toward one

another. Do the right thing and then

see if you don’t end up feeling the

right way.

Don’t assume that you must feel the

right way to do the right thing. So

God says, “Start giving and that will

be the process by which you start

changing.”

Once you start giving and living as a

generous person, a couple of things

happen: You start to become more

grateful. You realize all that you’ve

been given by God and others.

You’re more grateful, more thankful.

You stop just thinking about yourself

and you start thinking about others.

You stop thinking about what you

want, you start thinking about what

they need and giving starts to change

you. It starts to change you.

He’s looking for people who are

going to take the money that he gives

them and then to use them in a way

that is godly and good.

As a general principle, life tends to

just go better for people who are

more generous. It’s that reap-what-

you-sow kind of thinking. It’s hard.

It’s a frustrating season for them.

But part of it is that they’ve not been

a generous people, yet they’re

expecting God to be generous with

them.

They’re in an economic downturn,

and times are hard. The first thing

they did is cut their giving to God.

That was the first thing they cut out

of their budget. You will be tested. I

will be tested. We will be tested,

principally speaking, to rob God.

In the Old Covenant, it’s called the

“Law,” and there are specific rules,

and God’s referring to one here in

Malachi 3—tithing the 10 percent.

In addition, there’s the New

Testament new covenant because

Jesus comes, fulfills all the old

covenant, and then we live in the

new covenant under grace. So

Romans 6:14 says we’re no longer

under law, we’re now under grace.

Firstfruits off the top, gross not net,

unto the Lord. In addition, he talks

about contributions in Malachi 3. So

this would be above and beyond

feasts, festivals, the poor, seven-year

giving, all kinds of things.

If you amortize it out, it’s 25-27%

percent of your gross income that

goes to the Lord.

God doesn’t just give an amount

because if he gave an amount, the

poor would really strain to meet it

and the rich wouldn’t strain at all.

God wants our giving to be sacrificial

so that rich and poor are being

generous and sacrificial.

So it’s to be cheerful. It’s to be

sacrificial. It’s regular, and it’s also

proportional so that those who make

more give more, and that those who

make less give less, but all give

something.

So the younger you are, the less you

give, and what that means for the

future of Christianity is that it is very

concerning, because as the older

generation passes away, the younger

generation is not making up the

difference.

In addition, the people who are least

likely to tithe, to give at least 10%,

are those who make more money.

Proportional to their giving, the poor

give a higher percentage than the

rich.

And some of you are thinking, “I’m

not going to give, but one day when I

make more, I will.”

Statistically it’s not true.

It doesn’t work like that. “I will rob

God so that one day I can be faithful

with my finances toward God.”

It doesn’t work like that.

We would say, well, let’s be careful

because sometimes what was in the

Old Testament is not erased in the

New Testament.

It’s actually increased.

In Malachi it’s interesting because

they gave the money to the temple,

but ultimately God says, “You are

robbing me.”

What we would tell you is you need

to meet with the Lord. You need to

pray to the Lord. You need to

budget with the Lord.

You need to pledge to the Lord.

And whatever that is, if it’s cheerful,

regular, sacrificial, proportional, then

do that, and don’t rob God.

Our fear is, if we give you a percent,

you will make it a ceiling and not a

floor. We would say that a tithe is

not necessarily a ceiling, but it’s

better to see it as a floor.

This is a good place to start a life of

generosity, and by God’s grace,

aspire to increase our giving through

the course of our life as we mature in

everything. You want to grow in

Bible knowledge.

You want to grow in service. You

want to grow in prayer. You should

aspire to grow in giving. It’s part of

your spiritual development and part

of your spiritual growth.

Some of you are going to really

struggle for two reasons. Some of

you will struggle because you’ll feel

like God is taking what is yours.

Well, that’s the problem. It’s his,

and you should be grateful that he

shares some with you.

SORCERY is: trying to manipulate

God, trying to control God, saying, “I

think I know what God is doing. I

don’t like it. I want God to do

something else. I need to change

God. I need to manipulate God. I

need to redirect God.” That’s

sorcery. It’s spirituality. It’s paganism.

This is how non-Christian spirituality

thinks. “Through karma, you can

control your future.”

Word-faith teaching—“If you speak

it, it will come back to you, and God

will have to bring your words to pass

because you have authority like he

did in creation”—which is insane.

Principally we believe that God is

generous toward those who are

generous, but we will never make

you a promise that God is a means

by which to gain more wealth so that

you can feed your idolatry of money.

We may be talking about your

wallet, but ultimately, it’s directed by

your heart, and giving reveals your

heart.

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.

Consumerism is a religion, and it’s

not a new one. And a consumer

knows what they want, and they look

at a religion and ask if they get what

they want without giving very much.

Here’s what God says, “You’re my

treasured possession.” Hear me in

this: you are his treasured

possession. You belong to him.

All of you belongs to him, and he

treasures you. He values you. He

purchased you through the gift of his

own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, that

you would be his children, his

people.

Well, this changes everything. If we

are his treasured possession, then he

is our treasured possession. Nothing

compares to the Lord. Nothing’s as

valuable as the Lord.

Nothing matters as much as the

Lord. And even if we lose our

treasured possessions, we’ll never

lose our treasured possession. The

world doesn’t understand this God.

We need you to love this God

because he has loved you, and if he’s

willing to make us his treasured

possession it is only fitting and right

that we would choose him as our

most treasured possession.