Book of Malachi - Ch. 2, Vs. 10-15 (04/02/2023)

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Last week, for those of you who weren't here, we finished up the section on the priests, the sins of the priests, rather, so we got that out of the way.

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I did want to add one additional note before we segue into the third section of Malachi this week.

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I don't know, I just had this thought at the end of last week,

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Brother John King preached in the book of Jude during the main service last week, which of course is one of the,

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I mean, talk about a little bitty book that packs a big punch, and of course he's talking about, one of the big themes there is talking about the false prophets, and you know, we just finished this section on the sins of the priests, and Malachi, or the

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Lord through Malachi, is talking to them and rebuking them, laying out some of the

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Lord's disciplinary actions for the things they were doing, and it kind of gives the sense like, you know, maybe this is happening to turn the priests back, and of course,

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I mean, I do think from the human viewpoint especially, you know, from Malachi's viewpoint, that's what was happening from the

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Lord's viewpoint, it could also have been more of a condemning rebuke, something to hold them up against, reminding them of the standards that they're being held up against rather, and so it made me think, you know, do these priests, because we're looking at the parallels of modern times as well, and we talked about this quite a bit last week, some of the things the priests were doing, similar to our quote -unquote spiritual leaders today that are making some of the same mistakes that the priests were, and so are these priests more like the, there's a passage in Titus, I guess

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I could read it really fast, where is it, let's see here, see if I can get to it real fast,

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I think it's 3 .3, where is it, oh, here we go, what does it say here, yeah, okay, so the question is, were the priests that we're reading about in Malachi, did they fit this mold a little bit better, and in Titus 3 .3,

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this is Paul saying, for we ourselves also were sometimes foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving diverse lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another, but after that the kindness and love of God our

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Savior toward man appeared, and he goes on, not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us by the washing and regeneration, renewing of the

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Holy Ghost, which he shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, the being justified by his grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life, so it started pretty rough, but it had a great ending for the group that Paul was referring to, himself being included, and so, you know, could the priests have been kind of just on a road, on the road to destruction, so to speak, here, from the human viewpoint, and through the rebuke of Malachi, and everything we've been reading, perhaps, you know, later, you know, came to that light, or were these priests better represented in the example given in Jude, which, of course, is a very, a very dark group of people, and I would argue that they probably are a better, a better parallel of that, simply because we know what is the next part of the story after Malachi is over.

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It's about 400 years of darkness before John the Baptist comes on the scene, and so, it's kind of, kind of adds another dimension to just the state of the, what the state of these people were, these guys at this time, if you want to extrapolate them out, and kind of use

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Jude as the example of these false teachers, these false priests, and then, it made me think about a verse that we had read,

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I can't remember which verse it was, let's see here,

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I'm kind of, kind of thinking out loud a little bit, because I wrote these down, I jotted these down quickly at the end of last week, which verse is it?

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Okay, Malachi 2 .3 says, Behold, I will corrupt your seed, this is the Lord, talking to these priests, and spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your solemn feasts, and one shall take you away with it.

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That phrase right there is really interesting, because if you all recall,

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Dad was just doing that topical series on the believer priests, and how some of their responsibilities worked, and he talked about the river

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Kidron, remember, and how that is where they would dispose of the unclean things, it'd be carried away, and that was representative of the temple being cleansed, and those sins being sent to hell, essentially, and so, you know, if it is the case that these were, in fact, the false priests, could it be that they were carried away, this is like God telling them they will be carried away, with the dung, with the refuse that Dad was recently talking about, down the river

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Kidron, which of course represented hell, and if that is a parallel, if they are a parallel of the false teachers in Jude, that would be the case.

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So anyway, I just thought I would add that little addition before we move on to the third section, which now moves away from the priests, specifically, and to a more broad group of people.

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So, y 'all can turn, well actually, let's see here, do I want y 'all to turn to Malachi right off the bat?

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I suppose so, go ahead and turn to Malachi, I'm going to read a very brief passage somewhere else before then, it's only a couple of verses though, so if y 'all would like to go ahead and turn to Malachi chapter 2, we'll begin in verse 10 today, and again, this is still the same chapter, but it begins a new section of Malachi in terms of what it's talking about, so it is moving beyond the sins of the priests, and now talking about the sins of the people more broadly.

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So, we just finished up the humiliation of the priests, and we're now moving on to a more broad rebuke of the

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Israelites as a whole, and throughout this section, again, just like we did with the priests, consider the parallels of why this people,

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God's people, are being rebuked to the way that God's people, and I put that in quotes because I'm talking more so of the groups of people that proclaim the name of the

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Lord, and we've talked about this in detail several times,

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I mean, the Lord knows whose are His, but from the human viewpoint, if you are going to, you know, again, proclaim the name of the

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Lord, and talk as if you are a follower of Him, you are going to be held to the same standard as one of His true people, and again, that's assuming that because there is societal gain to being a

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Christian, quote -unquote Christian, and a quote -unquote churchgoer, we know that there are some tares in the church, and they're going to be held to the same standard, and so think about those parallels as we go through this as well, but also consider the historical context, again, of just this group of people in Malachi, so, you know, there's a lot to be applied to our modern times here, but we are also reading about this historical people, so we're about to start this section, and what is the context of this group of people, the

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Israelites as a whole, leading up to this? Well, their purpose was to be, they were created to be a distinct people on the earth, a peculiar people, just as we are now, but a distinct people separate from the rest of the world, and so I'm just going to read a really quick passage really quick, this is, before we get into Malachi, that is, this is

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Amos chapter 3, the first couple of verses says, hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you,

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O children of Israel, against this whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying you only have

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I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities, and it's an interesting thing, because number one, we're given, you know, another clear example of this being a special people called out from the rest of the world that had a purpose to to live, you know, righteously and to glorify

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God their father, of course, through that, and yet even in this context in Amos, which is a different point in history, they're being rebuked then for their iniquities still, but it doesn't negate their reality that they were supposed to be a special people, they were created to be a special people, a distinct people on the earth, so that's the overall just broad context that the people of Israel find themselves in, and what do they do with that exactly?

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Well, we're about to find out. We already know in that Amos chapter, they weren't doing too great then, they weren't doing too great at this point either.

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Ada's trying to make her way up to the front. Let's see here, so one of the main concerns of this section here stems from the fact that the people were engaging, of course, in unfaithful activities between one another, and this activity was another way in which the covenant was being profaned, so let's get into it here.

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Again, this is Malachi 2, starting in verse 10, brand new section, and by the way, this section lasts all the way through most of chapter 3 as well, however, when we get to chapter 3, it's going to diverge a little bit, but we'll be in the section for quite a while.

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It says in verse 10, have we not all one father? Hath not one

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God created us? Why do we deal treacherously, every man against his brother, by profaning the covenant of our fathers?

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Now, that word treacherously, we're going to see that a number of times in the following verses. It's the

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Hebrew word ba -gad, if I'm pronouncing that correctly, and it basically means to be unfaithful.

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Well, that's one thing that it can mean. It can mean to act, well, treacherously is obviously a good translation, but it can also mean to act deceitfully, to act unfaithfully toward a person or people or God himself.

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So Malachi asks, why do we deal treacherously every man against his brother? And that is following the initial questions of have we not one father, have we not one, have not one

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God created us, created us for this special purpose, and yet here we are dealing treacherously with one another.

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It says in verse 11, Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem.

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So whatever is going on here, these unfaithful actions, these treacherous actions, are an abomination to God.

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So we know right off the bat, this is very serious stuff. Just like we were explicitly, you know, given all the examples of what the priests were doing and how bad they were right off the bat, now we move on to the people more broadly, and boom, you know, they're committing this abomination in Israel and in Jerusalem.

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It says, for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the Lord, which he loved, and hath married the daughter of a strange

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God. So we now start to get some clues as to what this abomination is exactly.

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So this unfaithfulness, again, it's considered abominable, an abominable thing to the

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Lord, and this verse starts to give us a glimpse as to why that is the case. And as we learn, what's happening here is the

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Israelites are starting to intermarry with pagans, and this was taking place among the people in a pretty, you know, wide -ranging sense at this point.

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Now, you know, we can hear that, and we can assume, or not even assume, but we know that this is already a bad thing.

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But again, it's crazy to remember the timeline here that this book is given.

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This is Malachi, the very end of the Old Testament, and we already know there have been countless other examples of God's people sinning, falling short, doing things, getting severely punished for them, and this is yet another thing that they have dealt with before, and yet they are falling into it again.

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How many examples do we have on marrying the pagans and going in unto them, that being forbidden, and what it leads to?

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We have a ton of examples of it, but I want to, you know, there are examples going all the way back to Exodus, but all the way through the

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Old Testament. And if y 'all want to turn to Joshua for just a second, we'll just read a few verses, but this will be just one example of, number one, it's showcasing that it's something you shouldn't do.

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Again, the level of it being forbidden. Number two, the results of it. Joshua 23, starting in verse 11, says, of these nations, talking about the pagan, heathen nations, even these that remain among you, and shall make marriages with them, which is exactly what they were all doing in the time of Malachi.

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I mean, we're reading Joshua right now, so this has been a problem for many centuries leading up to this point.

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And shall make marriages with them, and go in unto them, and they to you. Here's the results here.

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Know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive any of these nations out from before you.

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But they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land, which the

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Lord your God hath given you. These people at the time of Malachi know this.

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They know that this has happened to some of the generations before them. And as we'll talk about in a minute, they don't seem to care anymore.

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And it begs the question, why don't they care? Well, we'll get into that more in just a minute. But this is happening, is the point.

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Again, from these types of actions, we can see how the people reached a point where they simply just didn't care anymore.

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They no longer believed in God's word, because God has been telling them for, again, many centuries, but even through this prophecy that's happening right now, or through this word, rather, through Malachi, that this was an abominable thing.

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But they didn't believe God's word anymore. And for that, of course, there are consequences in their own right.

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So there's consequences for the Samaritans, but in a more broad sense, for simply believing that the

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Lord is going to keep his word, there's going to be consequences for that as well. So picking it back up in Malachi, this theme kind of continues a little bit, and we're going to see some, you know, maybe get them more information as to how exactly they have fallen into this state.

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So Malachi, starting back in verse 12 of chapter 2, "...the Lord will cut off the man that doeth this."

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So this abomination, this marrying of the pagan, the daughters of a false god, "...the

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Lord will cut off the man that doeth this." And they were doing this, as we know, "...the

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master and the scholar out of the tabernacles of Jacob, in him that offereth an offering unto the

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Lord of hosts." So this is including the priests that are doing this, it's including the men that offer sacrifices, their household, the scholar out of the tabernacles of Jacob.

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He doesn't leave anyone out here. These guys are going to be cut off for these actions that they are indulging in.

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So we're given another glimpse into, you know, the curse, as it were, that we got some information on,

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I think, earlier in verse 4 of the same chapter. This curse that the Lord has put upon them, and that if any

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Jew commits this particular sin of marrying a pagan, that they would be cut off.

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That's part of the curse they were under at this time. Of course, we know their blessings were being cursed from earlier in chapter 2, and now we're learning that they're going to be cut off.

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Their specific lineage is not going to be able to take part in the blessings moving forward because of these actions.

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But the last phrase at the end of verse 12 here is particularly interesting because, again, it emphasizes it.

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Let me read it one more time. One of the groups of people he's going to cut off is him that offer, I'm sorry, let me start over.

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Him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts. It's weird going back and forth in these verses because one verse we're reading about how bad they are, the next verse we're reading about them offering offerings, and then back and forth.

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It's important to remember here that the level of hypocrisy was possibly even beyond our comprehension.

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We are aware that people can be pretty hypocritical in the church today. Again, if we want to extrapolate this out and think of some examples that are similar, people can show up to church on a

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Sunday and look great, be wearing all the right clothes, saying all the right things, yada, yada, yada.

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The rest of the week they live like every other person in the world. That's hypocrisy, right? That's what these guys were doing as well.

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They were offering an offering unto the Lord, yet they were committing abomination that they knew was abomination without any care in the world.

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That last phrase is interesting because it emphasizes that hypocritical attitude of those who were committing the sin of marrying the pagans.

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They were still offering unto the Lord even though they were committing these sins. Perhaps it's a case of them wanting the blessings without the relationship.

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Maybe they thought if they could go through these motions, they would still be blessed, maybe, but live however they want.

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Think about that from the point of view of Christians today.

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Perhaps maybe they're going to church and maybe going to the Bible studies and going to the bake sales and doing things seven days a week for their church for the potential blessings that they are promised from the pastor, teacher, whoever.

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Yet, where's the one -on -one relationship with the Lord, right? That is a problem that permeates our society for sure, but apparently it was permeating this society as well, assuming that's why they were given the offerings.

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Now, maybe they were given the offerings for, again, just less so of thinking they were going to be blessed and more so for the societal people perceiving them as being good.

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Who knows? Point being, they were being hypocrites. Regardless of what they were after, they were being hypocritical.

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They were offering offerings to the Lord and yet committing abomination, turning around and committing abomination.

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The next second, verse 13 says, In this have ye done again, covering the altar of the

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Lord with tears, with weeping, and with crying out, insomuch that he regardeth not the offering any more or receiveth it with goodwill at your hand.

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Now, this is another interesting verse. That word insomuch, the

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Hebrew word, it means in regard to or in reference to. So you could read it, you're covering the altar of the

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Lord with tears, with weeping, with crying out, in regard to or in reference to him not regarding your offerings anymore and him not receiving your anymore.

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So it's almost like perhaps they are starting to realize the reality that, oh, wait a second, there's actually consequences to all the sins

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I've been committing now. The consequences of these people's sin, it's kind of being elaborated on here because what the context seems to apply is that it was actually the tears of the men.

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There are some commentators that think it's talking about the tears of the widows or the women that were being divorced so that the men can go marry the pagans.

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But the context seems to imply more that it's actually the tears of the men that left their wives for the pagans that were covering the altar with their tears.

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And so you'd ask, well, why are they over there bemoaning the situation they find themselves in?

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Well, it's because now they're starting to realize that the Lord is no longer receiving their offerings and their hypocritical offerings that you might add.

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And so perhaps that's what's going on here. Again, the context seems to indicate that.

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Another thing that it could be maybe is that they were just being overly emotional to try to, again, appeal to the religiosity of the thing, kind of like the people that Jesus was talking about blowing their trumpets before throwing their ties in the bowl or something.

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Maybe they were weeping and covering the altar with tears as they sacrificed just to look more holy.

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I suppose that could also be what it's referring to. But it seems like this is the moment this verse is referring to the moment in time when they realize the

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Lord's like, no, I'm not. I'm not accepting this. And I haven't been for some time because of X, Y, Z.

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And then, you know, all of the reasons they've been rebuked up to this point and will still be rebuked moving forward. So their hypocritical offerings are no longer being offered.

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Perhaps they realize that at this time and they are now covering the altar and the tears and their tears of realization.

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Verse 14 says, Yet ye say, wherefore? So here we are yet again.

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So they're covering the altar with their tears because the Lord is no longer accepting their offerings.

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And they ask why. And this isn't the first time they've kind of questioned why God is doing his thing, whether it be something he's saying, a statement he's making.

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Remember, the whole book started with the statement, I have loved you. And they questioned that. And then there's been two or three more of those examples at this point.

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You have profaned my altar. They ask why you have defiled your sacrifices. They ask how.

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And so now here they are again. He's saying, I'm not going to accept your offerings anymore. And they say, why or how?

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Wherefore? And then he answers and he says, because the Lord hath been a witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously and or unfaithfully.

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Yet is she thy companion and the wife of thy covenant. So he's telling them, look. So again, he's talking specifically about divorce here.

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And he's saying, I was a witness between you and your wife, the wife of your youth at the time you guys made this everlasting covenant between each other.

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And she is your companion. She is the wife of your covenant. And yet you've dealt treacherously with her.

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You've dealt unfaithfully. What this verse is telling us is essentially a couple of things.

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Number one, the Lord has been watching something that they have forgotten about. Something we're going to revisit in a second.

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The Lord has been watching these guys. Their sins weren't hidden, obviously. I mean, we know that, but it seems like they had forgotten this truth on their own at some point.

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Their sins were not hidden and he will enact justice, which of course is something we'll be seeing again in the following verses, but not for the first time.

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These people here are now acting oblivious to the sins that they were committing. So what is

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Malachi doing? He's simply spelling out for them once again, in crystal clear detail, the sins that they were committing.

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And he reminds them that again, the Lord has been watching, the Lord is aware, and possibly even implying kind of a reminder that he was again, the original witness between these men and the wives of their youth and marriage.

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While that covenant was taking place, the wedding ceremony, we know the legality of there being witnesses around, but the

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Lord, of course, is the ultimate witness over that covenant. And Malachi could be reminding them of that as well.

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And he was a witness. God was a witness of that covenant. And now they are breaking the covenant through divorce, which is made even more clear in verse 16, which we're going to get to in a second.

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But here they are again, just acting totally oblivious to why they're receiving this type of rebuke.

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Why is he not accepting our offerings anymore? As if it wasn't abundantly clear. And so they're reminded of the why, you know, at this point.

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Now, let's go ahead and go to verse 15 for a second. I mean, this theme obviously continues for the remaining verses of this chapter, but it starts to get really interesting here.

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Verse 15 says, and did not he make one?

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I'm going to read, I'm going to read 14 again and then segue right into 15, because this is an interesting verse. Starting at verse 14 again, it says, yet ye say, wherefore, because the

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Lord has been witnessed between thee and the wife of thy youth against whom thou has dealt treacherously, yet is she thy companion and the wife of thy covenant.

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Verse 15, and did he not make one yet? Had he the residue of the spirit and wherefore one that he might seek a godly seed, therefore take heed to your spirit and let none deal treacherously or unfaithfully against the wife of his youth.

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Now, when I first read that verse, I was the first part of it. I was like, all right, you know, this worded kind of funny.

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Uh, I need to break out the commentaries and see what's going on here. And I, so I opened it up the first commentary, my initial go -to, it talks about how this is, you know, what the toughest verse in Malachi to interpret.

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And it goes on to explain why. And I was like, well, that wasn't very helpful. So I went to the next one and the next commentary said the exact same thing.

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So then I read a couple of more and they are all, they all begin with talking about how this is the toughest verse in Malachi to interpret.

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And I was like, okay, I'm going to go to the big leagues here because you know, this is, this is not helping at all.

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So I went over to, uh, I checked out Calvin's commentary on Malachi and I'll read it to you in a second, because I'm actually going to read portions of his commentary on it.

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But he essentially was like, this is a very obscure passage. And I was like, what am

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I going to do now if I can't get help from these guys? And of course they would, they all went on to give, you know, their interpretation of it.

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And I'll explain why I'm going to read Calvin's in a second, but apparently this has been a pretty hard verse to interpret for biblical scholars and commentaries for a long time.

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I mean, it's going all the way back to Calvin at the very least, and most likely before him. In fact, I know before him, because in his commentary, he referenced

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Jerome and pointed out why he thought he was wrong. It was just really crazy stuff. So this has been a tough verse for interpretation.

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And we know that the Hebrew, you know, the Hebrew language, dad talks about this all the time.

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The Greek is precise. Whereas the Hebrew is more, is more, how do you word it dad? Not more broad.

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It adds color. It's in pictures. It adds like so much, um, to the, to the picture.

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It like adds so much color to the picture where sometimes in certain verses, it's like, okay, so, you know, again, how are we going to interpret this?

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So apparently this is one of those verses for a lot of commentators. And so, oh, and, and so again, just a number of commentators agree, all the ones that I looked at agreed that it was an interesting verse.

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But after, you know, taking a look at a number of them, multiple commentaries, I'm going to share with what

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I believe fits the context of this passage plainly. And that is to say, an interpretation that in my opinion does not add, it does not add obscurity, but rather, you know, starts adding some clarity to it as to how it fits with the context of the rest of the verse or the rest of the chapter.

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Because again, some of the commentaries I read, the interpretation they were taking of that single verse was very bizarre.

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Like I, it didn't fit with the rest of the, the, the context of this passage we're reading in, which is, you know, just talking about, it's kind of a simple, a pretty simple theme here.

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It's talking about God's displeasure with rampant divorce for, of their, of their, the wives of their youth for the pagan women.

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And, you know, just frivolously approaching, you know, your marriage vows in such a flippant manner.

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And so that's, that's the context where we find this verse in. And so what

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I'm going to do now is I'm going to read Calvin's commentary. And I want to say really quick,

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I'm reading Calvin's. This isn't a private interpretation. I found a number of other commentaries that are really solid.

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Feinberg was one of them. What was another one? Matthew Henry. You know, he's pretty solid in a broad sense.

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Brother Billy used to quote Matthew Henry all the time. And a couple others that, that agree with this particular interpretation of the verse.

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But as you can imagine, there's some eloquence that comes with Calvin's description of it.

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And so I wanted to go with his here. And let me read, it starts, I just want to read his first sentence. He says, you know, there is in this verse some obscurity.

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That's how it starts. And I was like, this is after like four commentaries. I was like, oh man, if Calvin says so, this could be interesting.

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So let's see what he has to say about verse 15 here. He says, um, has he not made one that is, that is, was not

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God content with one man when he instituted marriage and yet the residue of the spirit in him here, then the prophet takes the residue of the spirit, so to speak for overflowing power for God could have given to one man, two or three wives in as much as the spirit failed him, not informing one woman as he inspired

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Eve with life. So also he made, I'm sorry. Also he might have created other women and imparted to them his spirit.

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In other words, he could have done that. He had plenty of spirit to impart in order to do that. He continues, he might have then given two or four or 10 women to one man, to one man, for there was a spirit remaining in him.

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But before we proceed farther, we must bear in mind his object, which was to break down all those frivolous.

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And he's talking about Malachi's object in this verse here. It was to break down all of those frivolous pretenses by which the

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Jews sought to cover their perfidy. He says that in marriage, we ought to recognize an ordinance divinely appointed, or to speak more distinctly, that the institution of marriage is a perpetual law, which it is not right to violate.

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For there is therefore no cause for men to devise for themselves various laws, for God's authority is here to be regarded alone.

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And this is more clearly explained in Matthew 19, 8, where Christ refuting the objection of the Jews as to divorce says, from the beginning, it was not so.

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Though the law allowed a bill of divorce to be given to wives, yet Christ denies this to be right. By what argument?

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Even because the institution was not of that kind, for it was, as it has been said, an invoidable bond.

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So now our prophet, talking about Malachi here, reasons saying, has not God made one?

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That is, consider within yourselves whether God, when he created man and instituted marriage, gave many wives to one man.

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By no means. Ye see then that spurious and contrary to the character of a true and pure marriage is everything that does not harmonize with its first institution.

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For it is evident that the prophet here calls to attention of the Jews to the true character of marriage, and this could not have been otherwise known than from the very institution of God, which is, as we have said, a perpetual and inviolable law.

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For God created man, even male and female, and Christ also has repeated this sentence and carefully explained it in the passage which we have quoted.

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And here the prophet sharply goads the Jews as though they wish to overcome God or to be more wise than he.

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Put a pin in that for a second, because in a minute when we get to like verse, I think, 16 or maybe 17, we actually get some insight as to, again, the attitudes that these guys had in kind of carelessly going about these things without any fear as to what

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God might do about it. And so Calvin is kind of commenting on that a little bit there.

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He sharply goads the Jews, let's see here, wish to overcome

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God or be more wise than he. He continues, had he not, he says, an exuberance of spirit, he takes spirit, not for wisdom, but for that hidden influence by which

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God vivifies men. Could not God, he says, have put forth his spirit to create many wives for one man?

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But his purpose was to create one pair to make man a husband and a wife.

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Is God then was not without a remaining spirit and yet did not exceed this measure? It hence follows that the law of marriage is, let's see here, the law of marriage is violated when man seeks for himself many wives.

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The meaning of the prophet is now, I think, he says, sufficiently clear. So again, this is

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Calvin interpreting this tough verse, but it seems consistent not only with, as he is putting it, the institution of marriage that God has put forth from the beginning, but in the context of divorce and marriage that the

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Jews at this time were taking part in, that Malachi is giving them this contrast and reminding them that is not how

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God set it up. I'm almost done here because this is, this is all really interesting stuff, but he continues, he says, because the verse, it then, it moves on from that and the rest of the verse says let's see here.

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Okay. Did you not make one yet had the residue of the spirit and wherefore one that he might seek a godly seed?

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So what does Calvin have to say about that part right there? He says the seed of God is to be taken for what is legitimate.

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And this part is really interesting to me. For what is excellent is often called God in Hebrew and also what is free from all vice and blemish.

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He sought then the seed of God that is he instituted marriage that legitimate and pure offspring might be brought forth.

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Hence then the prophet indirectly shows that all are spurious who proceed from polygamy because they cannot be deemed legitimate children.

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And dad and I were talking about this last night. Even if man wants to go and mess up God's ordained marriage order here, they can go out, they can have more wives.

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The Mormons do it all the time. Obviously we even had Kings in the old Testament that did this. People throughout all of history have engaged in polygamy, obviously, but are they, you know, getting their way around God's order?

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Well, what Calvin is saying is you can go marry as many women as you want, but there's only one legitimate line.

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What you're going to do is you're going to have a bunch of illegitimate kids. And it's funny because if you think about the Kings of England and times past, what would they do?

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They'd have the queen and that was the legitimate line, but they would have a bunch of mistresses over here with a ton of kids. And when those kids would be born, what did they do?

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They sent them off to the monastery and they sent them off to the, um, with, you know, with the nuns or they weren't called nuns in England, but you know, uh, uh, uh, they, they would send them off to do these weird other, you know, things because they knew they could not be there to compete with the actual legitimate line.

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So you have a bunch of illegitimate children and this is in, in Calvin gets even stronger here. So first he says, he can, he says, because they cannot be deemed legitimate children, nor he continues, nor ought any to be so counted, but those who are born according to God's institution.

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In other words, only those born within God's institution are actually legitimate. He says, when a husband violates his pledged faith to his wife and takes another, and he subverts the ordinance of marriage, he cannot be a legitimate father.

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And obviously that's really strong. And I I have to think about that one for a little bit, because again, we know that David engaged in this, that Solomon engaged in this, some of the, uh, some of the, the most prime characters of the old

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Testament, um, uh, engaged in polygamy had a number of kids.

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They weren't all legitimate, obviously, but Calvin goes as far as to say, they are not legitimate fathers. Now, I don't know, you know, if you can reach that conclusion or what the basis is for him reaching that conclusion, because he doesn't jump into it much more than that.

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But point is, Calvin was being very strong on the breaking of this institution here. Did you have something,

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Matt? Would that be implied that he would be, he would be a illegitimate father to the children that are not under?

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That may have been what he was talking about. I mean, he, he doesn't, he doesn't get very specific there.

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It's pretty broad. Go ahead, dad. Well, I've had some time to think about that while you're teaching.

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We have to remember Calvin is just a man, a magnificent man, just a man.

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I think he missed it a little bit. I think he should have stuck with the context of this, which is the same thing said that from the beginning, it was not so one man, one wife, that's

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God's ultimate plan. Thing that breaks down Calvin's argument, shows it to be somewhat less than perfect is that Solomon doesn't say

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Solomon, it's Calvin shows Calvin somewhat less than perfect is because Solomon became the lineage of Christ and he came from David's third wife, who he got by killing the husband.

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So Solomon could not have been illegitimate. But the whole point is, see, now this is great for our young men and women.

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As you try to interpret scripture, stick with the context. Don't add or take away because you get in trouble.

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He was great when he said, okay, you go back to Jesus said it was not so from the beginning.

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And I love most of what he said. But when he starts talking about that the other children are illegitimate and that the father is illegitimate, that part is totally untrue as proven by scripture.

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So he missed it. Well, and one of the greatest minds of all time, or is interpreting scripture.

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So what that tells us is, read the commentaries, right? It's like eating fish, eating meats without bones.

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Well, and obviously, this is a commentary that I would agree less than perfect.

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And even some of the stuff he says at this end of this paragraph, it's certainly what's the word

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I don't know if extrapolates the right word, but he, like you said, he's going along, he's talking about the verse, he's getting it in context.

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But then he goes out of the bounds of that context to add a little bit of his thoughts on basically marriage in general.

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Go ahead. Here's what I would call it. You might want to repeat some of that. Sure. Could it be that the most strict context here is when you go outside the marriage, and you marry a pagan idol worshipping woman, because David didn't do that.

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He always married Jewish women, who knew God, worshipped God, and so forth.

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So, you know, that could play a part in what

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Calvin was trying to get to. Sure. But I think Calvin took it too far in the argument, because he was kind of, you know, if you think about the time that Calvin lived in, right?

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Those guys, as amazing as they were, they brought a lot of Catholicism with them.

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Oh, I know. Yeah. Roman Catholic Church considered it to be like unpardonable sin if you divorce.

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That's not good at all. It was a thing the Catholics added.

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It was wrong. And Calvin may have brought those feelings with him.

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He seems to have a very, very strong feeling against divorce. That's a great lesson.

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The whole end of paragraph is like that. I will say one of the things, like when I was reading his part about the illegitimate children, and maybe

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I'm wrong. Maybe he's literally talking about any additional wives ever. I assumed he was talking about either like concubines or a mistress or whatever.

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Whereas in your example, Bathsheba, she was an official wife of David. But even outside of that,

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I think there is an important distinction in that Malachi is talking about the pagan women, which was, think about this for a second.

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David, Solomon, and I'm not, let me preface this by saying, I am not supporting polygamy in any way.

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But David and Solomon weren't explicitly told don't have those other Hebrew wives. However, the

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Israelites as a whole were told countless times, do not marry the pagan women ever under any circumstances.

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So I do think the emphasis is more on the pagan women than the other side of that coin.

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But Malachi still talks about the institution as being one. So that's in there too.

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So obviously there's importance aside from the pagan women, he is still bringing it full scope, if you will, and putting attention on, did he not make one?

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One institution of marriage is again what Calvin is referring, or what Calvin believed that is what he's referring to.

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That part I would agree with. And yeah, and let me just read just his conclusion really quick.

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But he says, therefore, he says, Malachi then draws his conclusion, therefore, watching your spirit that is take heed lest any should deceive the wife of his covenant.

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So, you know, there's definitely, it definitely helps bring some clarity to it, though, as we just discussed,

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I mean, there was certainly some of his own flavor, his own of his commentary there. And I mean, it's one reason why

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I don't necessarily like quoting straight commentary, because regardless of who you're reading, whether it's

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John MacArthur, Spurgeon, Calvin, some of the guys we love most, they can be, you know, there can be a lot of non extra biblical stuff thrown in there too.

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But again, this very obscure passage that they all referred to, you know, it's bringing, it's giving us contrast, it's giving the

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Israelites here contrast between the actions they were doing, the unfaithful marriage, breaking of the marriage vows, going and marrying the pagans, the marrying of the pagans was the abomination.

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And they are also reminded that the institution of marriage as it was from the beginning was, as he says, he made one.

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And he even gives us the reason why one he says in where for one that he might seek a godly seed.

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So the it's so that God, he put this institution in place is a picture of how he through his marriage, if you want to put that way to his people,

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Israel, and then later to the church can have that spiritual remnant, his seed, his godly seed, that being the elective course.

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And so I think that could be a reference to that he talking about the reason this institution was put in place in the first place was to represent that godly lineage that would come from that institution that was ordained.

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So pretty interesting stuff. And yeah,

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I mean, it's one of it was kind of kind of funny to get to that verse be like, Oh, I just need some quick clarity on that.

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It's kind of worded funny. And then lo and behold, it was not so not so simple, apparently.

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Well, we ran out of time, we only have a couple of verses left in this chapter. But we'll go ahead and save those for next time.

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Do you guys have anything else you'd like to share? Before we close out today? I hate having to close it out here because this theme obviously continues and some of what dad was just talking about.

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I'm going to be carrying it over into the next couple of verses because divorce is a pretty interesting topic.

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And we're in a passage talking about it. And so there's some other passages that we're going to take a look at in regard to like dad was saying, it's the unpardonable sin that certain denominations and certainly

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Catholics have. And yet, God himself divorced his wife.

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Why? He does hate it. In fact, it tells us in verse 16, just to jump the gun a little bit that he hates the putting away.

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And so how do we, you know, how do we reconcile that?

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Well, it's perfectly easy. And we'll talk about that when we get there. But we don't have time for it today. Dad, did you have a final thought?

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Well, right. And that's where we're going.

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But I raised my hand because what I thought, I think, if you can think about,

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I'm sure you're going to carry this into the next subject. I just think it's interesting in the

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New Testament, in the pastoral epistles, when it talks about the qualifications of an elder and a deacon.

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Yes. He must be the husband of one wife. And that implies very clearly that other church members had more than one wife from time to time.

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That's interesting. They were not qualified to be a pastor if they did that. So it's not as clear cut as Calvin tried to make it.

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But I understand why he would. You know, he's a godly man. He came out of Catholicism where it was even part of it.

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If you get a divorce, if you get kicked out, if you get excommunicated, even as a church member, if you get a divorce in Catholicism.

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So he came out of that. But God makes it clear that, and I think you made it clear,

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Ben, that God's best plan and woman for life are still death as this part.

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And Malachi made that clear. It wasn't Calvin who made that clear. Malachi did. Well, it's very obvious.

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It's what's best to the point that you're making. And we'll get into this a little bit more next week.

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It doesn't work out that way all the time, mainly because of our sin nature, I would argue. And even in the case of, again, were

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David and Solomon explicitly told not to take other wives? No. And Bathsheba ended up being the mother of the lineage of the

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Lord. It was a legitimate marriage. That one was. They did get married later. Their first child died. The illegitimate child died because it was out of wedlock.

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They later got married. Later Solomon was born. And the rest is history there. Yet think about the troubles they had.

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Think about how miserable their lives were in so many parts of it. That being David and Solomon.

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Solomon's, the end of Solomon's life is absolutely a tragedy. He died with over a thousand wives and concubines in a very unhappy state, relying not on God, but on his physicians.

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And he wasn't blessed at the end of his life. So we know what's best and it's crystal clear what's best.

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But to dad's point, it's not black and white either. And we'll talk about why that's the case next week.

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Because obviously that, you know, some people hearing that might think, well, that, that makes me a little uncomfortable.

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Well, I can empathize with that because black and white is kind of nice. We don't get it.

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We have to rely on the Holy Spirit to guide us through the passages and to see that it is consistent.

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There are contradictions and why things are the way they are. So I obviously, I never,

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I wanted to do Malachi. Wasn't because I was all excited to go through a passage on divorce, but here we are going through it.

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So we have a couple more verses left in that chapter before we move on. We'll get to that next week, perhaps, but for today, we'll dismiss and go from there.

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Dear heavenly father, Lord, thank you so much for this wonderful day. You bless us with, thank you for bringing us all together and for just allowing such a wonderful gathering of your children, but also just the fellowship of this specific church family that we're so thankful for.

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Lord, we ask you to just allow it to be edifying to all of us throughout the day and to encourage us and refresh us going into another new week.

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We ask you to be with the main services here shortly and just to be with all of us the rest of the day.