CRITICAL NOTES.
Malachi 2:6.] Levi preserved this fear in office and life. Truth] Instruction in the law was in truth. Iniquity] No injustice was practised in his life, nor was truth perverted by selfishness and self-interest Walked] Intercourse with God was progressive and confidential. In peace] “Equipped with the salvation bestowed upon him by God” (Malachi 2:5) [Keil]. And equity] Lit. plainness and straightforwardness, opposed to deceit, or crooked dealing. The consequence of faithful discharge in duty was the bringing back, i.e. the turning of many from sin to God’s fear.
Malachi 2:7.] This was the duty, the vocation of Levi, i.e. of the priesthood. Beautiful description of priestly functions. Keep] Preserve, store up, to distribute. Knowledge] The negative and positive precepts of the law; for people seek the law] i.e. instruction in God’s will, from his lips. Messenger] Interpreter (cf. Haggai 1:13).
Malachi 2:8. But] A remarkable contrast to their pious fathers. They taught for hire, and had respect to persons; departed from God themselves, and caused others to fall by their scandalous example. Corrupted] by false teaching, made the law not a light for duty, but a license for sin.
Malachi 2:9. Therefore] Jehovah, no longer bound by a covenant which they have broken, withdraws blessings, and makes them contemptible.
HOMILETICS
THE TRUE MINISTER.—Malachi 2:6-7
The prophet looks backward to the fidelity and zeal of Phinehas, which should have been copied by his successors. But “the lines of character are too large and fair to be those of mortal man. It is the ideal priest whom the prophet has in his mind, the archetype to which every true priest will seek to be conformed; not any single member of the priesthood—as indeed he himself intimates by using the tribal name ‘Levi’ in Malachi 2:4, instead of the personal name, ‘Phinehas,’ and by employing the abstract term, ‘the priest,’ in Malachi 2:7” [Cox].
I. The trne minister is holy in character. He stands in awe of God who has chosen him, and made a covenant of life and peace with him (Malachi 2:5). As “the messenger of the Lord of Hosts,” he feels his responsibility, and walks worthy of his high vocation. Spiritual work requires spiritual character as a prime qualification. “None but he who made the world can make a minister of the Gospel,” says Newton.
II. The true minister is devout in life. “He walked with God.” Consistency harmonizes conduct and creed. Holiness, like the law of gravitation, should regulate every motion of life. Men judge of the minister’s practice more than the minister’s sermon. The missionary Eliot resolved to leave something of God, heaven, and religion with all that came near him. In character and conduct we must be blameless, “unrebukable;” for, says Bp. Horne—“He who undertakes to reprove the world, must be one whom the world cannot reprove.”
III. The true minister is incorruptible in doctrine. “The law of truth was in his mouth.” He believes the truth of God, and it is the law, the staple of his instructions. No fear, no sinister, selfish principles lead him to keep back or pervert the truth. He conceals nothing, however unpleasant—shuns not to declare the whole counsel of God. “In doctrine showing incorruptness (untainted sincerity), gravity (dignified delivery), sincerity, sound speech (healthy discourse in public and private), that cannot be condemned” (Titus 2:7-8).
IV. The true minister is successful in labours. “And did turn many away from iniquity.” Success in one respect may not be realized. God can bless or withhold. One sows, and another reaps. But if we fail to convert, we may reprove, enlighten, and edify. But God promises success to faithful labour. We must not therefore set the sovereignty in opposition to the faithfulness of God. Aim to “convert the sinner from the error of his way,” and your work will not be in vain. Remember, as a motto and encouragement, “They that turn many to righteousness (shall shine) as the stars for ever and ever.”
THE FALSE MINISTER.—Malachi 2:8-9
In the former words we have a pattern priest described, to contrast the baseness and falsehood of those now reproved.
I. The false minister is negligent in duty. “Ye have not kept my ways.”
1. He perverts the truth in teaching. “Ye have corrupted the covenant of Levi.” They violated and defeated the intentions of it, and made it contemptible by false expositions and partiality. “But have been partial in the law.”
2. He departs from the truth in life. Not merely falls short of it, the best do that, but openly, insolently renounced and reversed it. “Ye are departed out of the way,” of knowledge, fear, and truth. “Her priests have polluted the sanctuary, they have done violence to the law.”
II. The false minister is pernicious in example. “Ye have caused many to stumble at the law.” Instead of keeping integrity of character, and shedding light on the path of peace, by doctrine and example, he misleads, casts a stumbling-block in the ways of others, and causes them to fall. Fenelon says, “that moral instructions have no weight nor influence, when they are neither supported by clear principles nor good examples.” “The sin of the young men was very great before the Lord; for men abhorred the offering of the Lord.”
III. The false minister is cursed in his work. “I also made you contemptible and base before all people.” God is no respecter of persons—if men are—and the lot of the unfaithful minister will be as his service. “According as ye have” acted, so will be your punishment. In spite of office, unholy men will be held in contempt by the mass of the people. Careless and unprincipled clergy will ever sink in public estimation.
1. They break the covenant of peace. Therefore forfeit all its blessings.
2. They deeply disgrace themselves. These are made base, and made base before all the people.
3. They exclude themselves from office. “I said indeed that thy house, and the house of thy father, should walk before me for ever; but now the Lord saith, Be it far from me; for them that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed.”
HOMILETIC HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
Malachi 2:6-7. I. The priest’s character. (a) Intelligent: If he must keep, he must get, knowledge. (b) Consistent; he must walk with God. (c) Truthful; and (d) holy. “The lips of the righteous feed many.” II. The priest’s dignity not a common calling, but an ambassador of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:20). “For he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts.” III. The priest’s vocation.
1. To give instruction. “They should seek the law at his mouth.”
2. To be impartial. “Doing nothing by partiality.”
3. To restore men to God. “Turn many away from iniquity.”
Here is a solemn warning to the Christian clergy. If such was the duty of the Levitical priesthood, and such the penalty for not performing it aright, how much more imperative is the obligation of the Christian priest to “keep knowledge,” and to instruct the people in sound doctrine; or, as St. Paul expresses it, “to give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine, to meditate on these things, and give himself wholly to them” (1 Timothy 4:13; 1 Timothy 4:15); “to speak the things which become sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1); “to hold fast the faithful word, so that he may be able by sound doctrine to convince the gainsayers” (Titus 1:9). And how much sorer will be his punishment if he fails to discharge it! (cf. Titus 1:7; Titus 1:9; 2 Timothy 2:2). It is to be feared that this warning is greatly needed in the present day! [Words.].
Malachi 2:6. He “walks” with God in a happy consent and progress; for “how can two walk together except they be agreed?” To walk is not only to move, but to move onward. He not only walks with God, but he walks with him “in integrity and peace:” two lines of advance are specially marked out for him—the generous uprightness which saves his teaching from sinister perversions, rules his personal conduct, so that he is drawn aside by no selfish or impure motive; and, moreover, he possesses himself ever more fully of all the blessings which conduce to peace or well-being. Thus, by his own pure and happy life, no less than by his wholesome and unperverted doctrine, he “brings back many from guilt,” convincing the sinful of the mistake they have made, and leading them, through repentance, to that way of life and peace in which he himself is advancing [S. Cox].
Malachi 2:8. (cf. Nehemiah 13:29). Prophecy a comment on history.
Malachi 2:9. Punishment to unfaithful ministers.
1. It is in proportion to their exaltation in office.
2. It is impartial.
3. It is public before all. In partiality and pleasing men, they bring upon themselves contempt: in faithfulness and pleasing God, they gain the testimony of a good conscience and the approval of God.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 2
Malachi 2:6-9. It really is fine to observe with what native ease Malachi rises into the higher region of thought. While dwelling on the sins of the priests he moves in the lower, the ceremonial elements; he insists on the maimed rites and blemished sacrifices, on the perfunctory and the contemptuous spirit with which they lounged through the service of the Temple. But no sooner does he attempt to frame a conception of what the true priest should be, than all that is forgotten; we hear no more of altar and sacrifice: his thoughts are riveted on the moral aspects of the priestly vocation—how holy a man, how wise a teacher, how careful and friendly a guide, the priest should be. When we are thinking only to hear that the sons of Levi are to offer clean and perfect, instead of blemished and polluted, sacrifices, to delight in the ministrations of the sanctuary instead of despising them, as much to our surprise as pleasure, he places before us a lofty spiritual ideal of character and service, well-nigh, if not altogether, beyond the reach of mortal powers: he pronounces a eulogium on Levi which we should hardly dare to inscribe, as an epitaph, on the tomb of the holiest saint, or even on that of an inspired apostle [S. Cox].