Partiality In The Pulpit

When Institutions Rot: Decay in the Fifth-Century Priesthood 0:19

Have you ever watched a piece of fruit or food mold? If you take a ripe, healthy tomato, you take a ripe, healthy apple, you set it on your counter, initially it looks wonderful. Initially it looks edible. Initially it looks like it would benefit you to partake in it.

A day goes by and really not much has significantly changed. But fast forward a week, a month, what happens? Well, the molecules within the fruit, the food, begin to decompose. Microorganisms exist that begin that process and break down the food's composition and And in short order, that food is not looking so good.

You do not desire to eat it after it has sat out for a period of time, after a film has gathered on it, or worse, it is no longer what it once was. Here's the thing. Sometimes it's not just food that rots. Sometimes it's our institutions.

Sometimes it's our practices. In the 5th century, something rotten was going on in Israel. In the 5th century, there was decay taking place everywhere, and yet the people did not notice it. Specifically, and in chapter 2 we see this, the apple of God's eye.

It was God's people, but it was especially the priesthood that He had consecrated for His namesake, for His glory, for His honor. People that were called to be holy and help other people grow in their holiness. The priesthood was given a magnificent charter, a magnificent mandate. But, but, to their shame, they set it aside.

They set aside their charter. They took the mantle off of their shoulders, so to speak. They set these things down. Now, they kept the pomp and ceremony, because everyone wants to be known as the priest such and such.

They kept the pomp and ceremony. If you were to look at Israel through a telescope at that point and look at their practices from afar, a lot would have seemed normal. There were still sacrifices. There was a temple.

The priests were still dressed up. There was a lot going on that looked maybe even healthy from afar. If you take an apple that started to go bad, And you said, way back on the counter, I can't tell the condition. I can see it's an apple, but I don't know.

I don't know how it's already begun to rot. Well, the practices, the people, the priesthoods, something was rotten in the state of Denmark, so to speak, in the time of Malachi.

Lowering the Bar: Corrupt Sacrifices and the Least We Can Do 2:36

Now, what were they doing that was so bad? Well, again, we covered some of this in the past couple of weeks. Last week, we saw that the priests, in particular, had begun to permit just the worst kind of sacrifices to take place in in their midst. They were allowing the worst sacrifices that the people had to offer to be that which was heaved up upon the altar table and given to God, as if God would be well pleased.

See, the inclination of the hearts of the people in Israel — and it's an inclination that's present in the common day as well — is to do whatever we think is the least amount by which God will be appeased with us and kind of bless us and let us do our thing. I've been doing this long enough to have some inkling what's in the heart of men, and I know this: we do what we think is the least we can do.

In general — not all of us, and not equally in the same way, but in general — we do that which will appease God, and then we go about our business. The people in Malachi's day, they did what they thought would appease God. They did the form and practices of the law. So they thought, well, we're doing it, at least we're doing it, and they thought God was happy.

Why did they think God was happy? Well, because they hadn't been struck dead yet. They looked around, they said, well, I gave this lazy, buck-toothed lamb last week and nothing happened. In fact, I had a pretty good week.

God must not care. He must be kind of indifferent to that. And as they all looked around, they all said, eh. And the bar got lower and lower.

I'm tempted already to dive into modern practice, because you and I both know that there are modern applications to the same issue. But in their context, the problem was they kept dropping the bar, dropping the bar, dropping the bar, to the point that they were just giving God anything. Last week we saw — well, it wasn't just that they gave the worst lamb they had or the worst goat they had.

Last week we saw this: some were just flat out stealing sacrifices from other people to give to God. They looked inward and they said, all right, well, I don't really want to have to give something. I can't spare too much here. The idea of sacrifice and actually giving God anything — there was some conflict in their hearts.

So they said, well, you know, Bob isn't looking, and Bob's lamb is what they took and gave to God. We saw this called out last week. The standards could not have been lower. Could not have been lower in terms of what the people were doing.

But the form and practice remained. The form and practice was still there, even if their hearts were not in it. Now we start to see why God was so angry. Why He was so disgusted as He watched this happen.

God Calls Out the Priests: When Bad Leaders Lead Badly 4:59

So last week saw that the priests were who God calls out in particular. Because He says, alright you, alright you priests. It's not good that My whole people are doing this. That's bad, but you're the ones in charge here.

You're the ones who are leading them. And you're leading them down the primrose path to perdition. I'll use some alliteration here. You're not taking them where they need to go.

You're leading them astray. And here in chapter 2, He builds on that. He says, I would take the dung from the very sacrifices of these diseased things you're giving Me. I'd like to rub the refuse from that on your faces.

God's displeasure is not insignificant. The priests had engaged in bad practices. As we're also going to see here as we go through the text, they also are engaged in bad theology, bad doctrine. Because towards the end of today's chapter, we're going to see that they began to show partiality.

It wasn't just that they're only doing part of what they should be doing, only keeping some of the laws that they wanted to keep, only reading some of the book that they should have read. The problem is that they were also partial with how they taught it, how they instructed folks in it, and how they held people accountable, and who they held accountable.

From top to bottom, things were rotten. And so God gets in their faces here in chapter 2.

The Commandment to the Priests: Give Glory to My Name 6:11

“And now, O priests, this commandment is for you. If you will not hear, and if you will not take it to heart, to give glory to My name, says the Lord of hosts, I will send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have cursed them already, because you do not take it to heart.”

— Malachi 2:1-2 (NKJV)

Let's look at verses 1 and 2. I'll read this, then we'll just work our way through the balance of the text. Verse 1. And now, O priests, this commandment is for you.

All right, so he's talking to the priests. In a sense, he's talking to everybody, but he's definitely calling out the priesthood in particular. Verse 2. If you will not hear, and if you will not take it to heart to give glory to My name — which was in the very job description of being priest, that was really it.

Giving glory to God was what priests were supposed to do. And God says, if you won't do your job here, if you won't do your job to give glory to My name, I will send a curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I've cursed them already, because you did not take it to heart.

This is not the first prophet or for the first warning that the people had. God is so patient. God is so patient with us. He's so patient with His people.

Dear heavens, we go astray in so many ways, and He's patient. But His His patience and His forbearance has a limit. And He looks at the priest and He says, all right, you continue to do this, the curses await. The priests, the priests, the priests, the priests were God's men, so to speak.

They were the leaders. When bad leaders lead badly, the people follow, and they go off a cliff. And that's what was taking place. That's what the people were doing.

The priests were leading people off a cliff. People looked around. They said, well, if the priests think it's acceptable, then it must be. If the priest looked at Bob's sacrifice and didn't have a problem with it, then mine's got to be good, right?

Because he's the priest. And he operates on behalf of God. If the leadership in a church, if the leadership in Israel lowers the bar, strives for the low end of the pool — excuse me, the shallow end — in their worship and their glory, that people will follow suit. Well, again, that's exactly what was going on.

And because of that, the glory of God was being cast underfoot. And so that's what God calls them out when He says, if you will not hear and if you will not take it to heart to give glory to My name, if you won't stop what you're doing wrong and start doing what you ought to be doing right, if you're going to keep doing what you're doing, a curse awaits.

I will set a curse upon you and I will curse your blessings.

The Curse of the Covenant: Refuse Spread on Their Faces 8:22

“Behold, I will rebuke your descendants and spread refuse on your faces, the refuse of your solemn feasts; and one will take you away with it. Then you shall know that I have sent this commandment to you, that My covenant with Levi may continue, says the Lord of hosts.”

— Malachi 2:3-4 (NKJV)

All right, let's read more about that curse in verses 3 and 4. Verse 3, behold, now the moment that happens, the minute God says behold, you behold. Anytime in scripture the word behold comes up, that's a word of warning. It's a word of transition.

It basically says your eyes should go boing. You should really be paying attention to what's going to happen. Well, here it's God who says it. God says to His people, He says to His priests, behold.

And then he adds this, I will rebuke your descendants. I will rebuke your descendants and spread refuse on your faces. What you are doing, He was telling the priest, has consequences far beyond you. You lead your people off a cliff.

What do you think is going to happen to your progeny, to your descendants, to the people who follow? I will rebuke your descendants. I will spread refuse on your faces. That's the most genteel way to describe what God intends here.

I will spread refuse on your faces, the refuse of your solemn feasts, and one will take you away with it. Then you will know, then you will know that I've sent this commandment to you, that My covenant with Levi may continue, says the Lord of hosts.

Priestly Purity and the Impurity of the Heart 9:31

You know, one of the hallmarks of priestly service is purity. Think of the priests, right? Think of how they're supposed to consecrate themselves, wash their hands. You know, all the sanitizer we got out there, that's nothing compared to what they were doing.

The process of being a priest, even just being a layman in Israel, let alone a priest — there was all sorts of ceremonial cleanings and washings. There was all sorts of things and laws you're supposed to keep in order to remain pure, in order to be set apart, undefiled, and the like. They did all these different things.

Purity was central to who they were and what they did. And with that said, it should scream out to us when God, who is the king of purity, the king of holiness, looks to the priest who's supposed to model and reflect holiness, and He says, My intention to you is this: to wipe refuse on your faces.

In other words, to those who are supposed to reflect such purity, such cleanliness, those who couldn't touch a dead animal, so to speak, He's saying, I'm going to take the very refuse, the dung from these animals, wipe it on your faces. That those, symbolically speaking, that those around you — and those around you will know the impurity of your heart, will know the impurity of that which lays within.

Because I know, says God. I know, and the people will know, and here, thousands of years later, we know what these priests were up to. The refuse was truly wiped in their faces, to the point that even to this day, their actions, their choices are given our scrutiny. Specifically, God was talking about wiping the priest's faces with the dung of the same sickly animals that the priests were offering up to God.

And so, and again, in verses 3 through 4, he says, I'm going to visibly demonstrate the rottenness of your hearts in a way that everyone will be aware. And as a result, the people will be reminded of the covenant that I've made, says God. The covenant I made with your predecessor. So He says, you priests, you weren't the first priests I've had.

If I go back and I start with Levi — oh, Levi, now there was a priest. There was a priest. And He reminds them of the covenant promises He made to Levi.

The Covenant with Levi: A Model of Reverence and Truth 11:37

“My covenant was with him, one of life and peace, and I gave them to him that he might fear Me; so he feared Me and was reverent before My name. The law of truth was in his mouth, and injustice was not found on his lips. He walked with Me in peace and equity, and turned many away from iniquity.”

— Malachi 2:5-6 (NKJV)

Let's talk a little bit about Levi here in verses 5 and 6. Verse 5, My covenant was with him. So it starts with Levi, one of life and peace. And I gave to him that he might fear Me.

And so he feared Me, and he was reverent before My name. There's a contrast between Levi and them that God is trying to point them out to. So he feared Me, he was reverent to My name. The law of truth was in his mouth, and injustice was not found on his lips.

He walked with Me in peace and equity, and he turned many away from iniquity. As you may remember, Levi is one of Jacob's sons. The tribe of Levi was considered a priestly tribe out of which God's priests had come. And in verses 5 and 6, God says, remember Levi.

That Levi, he had his act together. That Levi, he knew what time of day it was. That Levi, he was honorable and pure and he was reverent. And he glorified Me, and truth was on his lips, and justice was not found in him.

And he didn't lead people down the primrose path to perdition. He didn't lead people off a cliff, as you were doing. He tells the priest, He says, he walked with Me in peace and equity, and he turned people away from iniquity. What were the priests of Malachi's day doing?

They were turning people towards iniquity. Headlong, deeply immersed, engaged in sin. Levi turned people towards God, towards righteousness, but these priests were not doing their jobs, and he was driving people into deeper and deeper sinful actions.

The Regulative Principle: Fearing God More Than Men 13:09

These priests were inviting and endorsing sinful activities in the worship. It's not a small thing when a priest or a pastor lowers the bar in terms of what you do in worship. I'll editorialize for a moment here. It's not a small thing when a priest or a pastor says, you know what, we're just going to lower the bar here in order to appeal to the goats.

We're going to not be as concerned about the needs of the sheep, not be as concerned about the reverence and the glory of God. We're going to be seeker-sensitive. We're going to do the things that the world likes in order to be relevant to the world. To that, God says the Hebrew equivalent of phooey.

That's not the call. That's not the objective. We walk and we lead people towards God, towards His honor, towards His reverence. Not away, and we don't lower the bar in any way.

But that's what the people are doing. The priests were doing Malachi's day, and that's something we see in the present. These priests were inviting, endorsing sinful acts. And because of that, the covenant that had been made with Levi, which had curses and blessings involved in it, as every covenant does — well, now it was time for the curse.

And it was well-deserved. See, godly leaders, godly leaders are supposed to fear God more than they fear men. But the inclination, when you look around, you see Bob and Stu and Fred and Fran, and they want you to engage in certain practices or to preach a little differently or to follow an approach that's a little more worldly.

The temptation is always to do that. The priests were listening to their own hearts, and they were listening to the whims of the people. They weren't turning to the book and following its regulative prescriptions. Godly leaders don't decide how to do what they do by following opinion polls, by listening to culture's desires in any given day, because culture changes.

Godly leaders, godly churches don't care what the prevailing culture thinks. Culture can and often does fly to the wind, but God's word remains true. Let God's word be true and all men a liar, Scripture says. Remember last week, God asked a rhetorical question.

He said, isn't there even one priest among you who would just close the doors to the temple and stop allowing these sacrifices to be offered? Isn't there even one, one who will do that which is righteous? In Malachi's day, the leadership had gone sour. They had gone south, rotten, and their practices had followed suit let's look at our remaining verses, verses 7-9.

The Lips of a Priest Should Keep Knowledge 15:43

“For the lips of a priest should keep knowledge, and people should seek the law from his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. But you have departed from the way; you have caused many to stumble at the law. You have corrupted the covenant of Levi, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore I also have made you contemptible and base before all the people, because you have not kept My ways but have shown partiality in the law.”

— Malachi 2:7-9 (NKJV)

For the lips of a priest should keep knowledge, and people should seek the law from his mouth. For he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. But you, you have departed from the way. You have caused many to stumble at the law.

You have corrupted the covenant of Levi, says the Lord of hosts. Therefore, I also have made you contemptible and base before the people, because you have not kept My ways, but you have shown partiality in the law Now, I will tell you, today's passage is daunting to preach from.

A Stricter Judgment: Preaching Only What People Like 16:30

It's a tremendous privilege and blessing to be able to speak God's word, but it is terrifying in many regards. James 3, God warns the pastors and the shepherds in this way. He says, let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment. The priests of the Old Testament, the pastors in the New Testament church, the teachers, elders, and the like, face a stricter judgment if they are to lead God's people into iniquity through what they say or what they fail to say.

You see, sometimes partiality is only preaching the parts of Scripture that the people like or will respond well to. You don't do anyone's favors if you only preach part of God's Word. A pastor's job is not to tell folks what they like or want to hear. Instead, they're supposed to tell them what they need to hear.

Because it is life-giving medicine. The lips of a priest, Malachi says here, the lips of a priest should keep knowledge. The lips should keep knowledge, should store up knowledge, should share knowledge, should preach knowledge, should teach that which is true.

Two Obligations: The Minister's Lips and the People's Seeking 17:38

And people, listen to this, because this is on all of us. And people should seek the law from his mouth. For he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. Now, in that statement of verse 7, I want you to notice there are two sets of obligations.

The first obligation is for the priest, and by extension you could say to the pastor, is to those who keep the knowledge of the Lord on one's lips. To those who preach and teach, those in positions of authority, positions of leadership, we are called to keep the word on our lips. Not what our whims and desires — you don't want that, you don't want what's on a man's heart.

What you want is that on his lips is the word of truth. What comes out of his mouth is the law, is the word and will of God. So that's the first obligation we see in this verse. That the priest, the pastor, the leader, the elder, the teacher is to keep the knowledge of the Lord on one's lips.

With that said, there's another obligation. Another obligation here. And that obligation is for the people, for the congregation, you could say, in our church. And the obligation is that just as the priest, the pastor, is called to preach and teach God's word, God's law, in a fully orbed, fully rounded way, the obligation on the congregation is that you are to seek nothing less.

The people should seek the law from his mouth. Let's see in verse 7.

Seek the Law, Not the Music or the Programs 19:00

You know, in our own day, I don't think people are looking for the law. Think of those who are checking out churches, sampling churches, checking out churches, visiting churches and the like. We've all done it, we've all been there. What have been the priorities that you may have had in times past?

Well, pastorally I know this, that the priorities of a lot of folks in the present are somewhat different than what we see in this text. Some of the main priorities that people have in modern days when it comes to looking for a church for their family, some of the main priorities are this.

Tell me about the music program. I'll get a call, someone will say, what kind of worship do you have? Is it traditional? Is it contemporary?

And right there, their entire interest in your church is vested in how you answer that question. Forget everything else. Forget theology, forget just about everything else. For a lot of folks, that's question number one.

Question number two might be this. What programs do you have for my children? What activities do you have? Tell me about your youth program.

Tell me what sort of retreats or things you do and engage in. Youth programs, music — these are good, important things. Fortunately here locally we are tremendously blessed in both these regards with the staff and the resources that we have. But as important as those things are, they're not the primary thing.

What are the people supposed to seek? Seek the law, seek the doctrine, seek the theology, seek the word, seek the will. Seek out churches and places where someone holds this up, preaches what it says, and then says, thus saith the Lord. You want something less than that, you're cutting off your own nose to spite your face.

You want something less than that, or you prioritize other things in its place, you are doing yourself no long-term favor. You are your children. No long-term favor. What we need most in this present day is a moving target outside these doors.

What we need is truth. What we need is equity. And what we need is the law. What we need is the word.

That's what we are to seek.

Defining Partiality: Dividing the Word or the People of God 21:10

As we wrap up this morning, I'll make one final observation with regards to verse 9, when there was a reference to the partiality in the law. I want to linger on this because this, I think, is a driving point in Malachi's writings. What does partiality imply to you? If someone says that a church showed partiality, what does that mean?

Well, for some, it may be the doctrine. It may be that they teach one thing, but not something else. It may be that there's certain verses that it adheres to, but not others. It may be that there's a partiality shown to certain people or classes of people.

It may be that the pastors, the leadership, will prioritize the interests of those who are wealthy and give much to the church and not others. Partiality is any time we take either the Word or people of God, the Word or people of God, and we divide it in some way with regards to the way that we apply truth to them.

So partiality can suggest preference for one doctrine over another, one verse over another, one passage over another, but it can also mean that we let some people's behavior slide when we ought not, when the word calls us to hold ourselves accountable. In Malachi's day, both errors were probably on display. Both errors were probably on display.

Whatever the case is, the priests, from one end to the other, they were not doing what they were called to do, they were being partial with their efforts, and they were not feeding their people a healthy spiritual diet.

Do Not Withhold the Medicine: Preach the Whole Gospel 22:28

You know, when my daughter was younger, many of you have heard this story, when my daughter was younger, much younger, she had cancer, she had leukemia. Now, part of the treatment for this process was that she underwent about two years of chemotherapy. Chemo across two years. Some of you have some experience with chemotherapy, so you know what's involved.

And you know that chemo is complex with regards to the dosages, the quantities, how and when it's applied to what age groups and the like. There's a lot of things about that mix that have to be just right for the individual which it's applied to. And so if you had, let's say you had a manufacturer of some of the drugs that are used, some of the meds used for chemotherapy.

Let's say a manufacturer one day decides to cut costs and leave out some key ingredients and then just continue to distribute the pills or the medicine. Well, if that medicine is stripped of some vital component that it needs, it no longer is efficacious. It no longer will do what it was created to do.

If you give someone a placebo who has cancer, what's going to happen? Well, nothing good. People who are sick need medicine. The same is true with regards to the gospel.

The world is filled with sick people. The world is filled with dying people. What people need is the gospel. And they don't need it dissected down to only those segments that the world will find appealing.

They need every part of it from one end to the other. And I tell you this, if you go to people and you say, I've got good news for you. I've got good news. God loves you and He wants you to have your best life now, and He has a great plan for you.

You know what will happen? People will say, hurrah! I love me too! Me and God, we're seeing eye to eye here.

People respond very positively to that. But you know what? The gospel message starts at this point. That the reason we need Jesus is not just to make our lives a little bit better.

The reason we need Jesus is not just to have our best lives now. The reason we need Jesus is because we are dead men and women, dead in our sins and transgressions. The wages of sin is death, and we've sinned a multitude of times over. That's why we need a Savior.

A Savior not just from the hardships of the world around us, not just from dire circumstances, not even from cancer and the like, but to save us from the wrath of God that is due to our sins. We need a Savior to save us from the consequences of choices that we make every day.

So a right understanding, a right conveyance of the Scripture starts with this premise, that we have a problem, and that problem is the wages of sin is death, but God, in His infinite love and wisdom and care and grace for us, and forbearance and patience and mercy — that although we have a problem, He has a solution.

He has a solution. And in due time, in due time, in His own time, He sent His son to Calvary to hang on a tree. The perfect lamb of God. The perfect lamb of God, which speaks to what it means to offer God perfect offerings.

The perfect lamb of God came down from a throne to be born in a manger to go to a cross. And when He was on that cross, the sins of people like you and I were imputed and placed upon Him. And His righteousness was imputed and granted to us who believe. He did the work from beginning to end.

And what we're accountable for is faith. To trust in Him, to trust in it, not to trust in ourselves. To trust in His fully completed work. And my encouragement to you this morning is that when you share that message with others, don't leave anything out.

Don't hide the reality of sin and the danger that it puts people in. Don't give people just part of the medicine that they desperately need. Do not show partiality with what you teach or who you teach it to. Convey the gospel in its full form and trust that God will use it to glorify Himself and to build His kingdom.

Let's pray