New Covenant Sacrifices

Malachi 1v6b-8 (Part 2)

20^th November 2020

Two weeks ago, we studied:

Malachi 1:6b-8
"It is you, O priests, who show contempt for my name.
"But you ask, 'How have we shown contempt for your name?'
"You place defiled food on my altar.
"But you ask, 'How have we defiled you?'
"By saying that the Lord's table is contemptible. When you bring blind animals for sacrifice, is that not wrong? When you sacrifice crippled or diseased animals, is that not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you?" says the Lord Almighty.

We saw that God accused His Old Covenant priests of showing Him contempt by offering blemished animals on His altar. We saw that we - the Christians - are all God's priests now, and so our offerings to God should also be without blemish. We saw that it's only reasonable that we should give God our best. So what are the offerings and sacrifices that God demands and deserves from us?

1 Peter 2:4-5
As you come to him, the living Stone – rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him – you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

Just as the Old Covenant priests would offer lambs, bulls and other creatures in the temple, we're called to offer our sacrifices in the context of the church, which is God's spiritual house, His New Covenant temple. Our sacrifices are not confined to church gatherings, but we should consider God's house first. When the Jews returned from exile in Babylon, the first building that should have been rebuilt was the temple. And today the first priority in your life and mine should be building the church, before building our own lives. That's the message of the prophet Haggai.

Just as God required perfect specimens from their herds and flocks, we too are called to make perfect sacrifices to God. This at least means singing to God with a whole heart. It wasn't OK then for a member of God's Old Covenant people to bring a diseased lamb to the temple as an offering, and it's not OK for me to bring a diseased heart into church worship. I don't mean that we can't bring our sadness, our sin and our brokenness to God. Of course we can and should do that. I mean we mustn't bring a diseased attitude towards God into worship. We can't worship Him and disrespect Him at the same time.

We can't pick and choose which songs we sing. It's disrespectful to God if we sing some songs loudly and enthusiastically because we happen to like them, and barely sing others, while shuffling our feet and staring at the ceiling because we don't happen to like them, or because they've been sung too often and we want something else now, or because they're new and we'd prefer something we know. It's also very discouraging to our brothers and sisters in Christ.

We must remember that a sacrifice of praise is a sacrifice. Sometimes you and I don't feel like singing. We have a headache, or we really dislike a song, or it's in the “wrong” key. Make a sacrifice to God! We don't sing worship songs because it's enjoyable, although it is. We sing to Jesus because He's worth it.

Imagine being in heaven when one of the angels says, “Let's sing this song to God”. Are you really going to say, "No, thanks. I don't like that one"? If we're not going to do it in heaven, let's not do it now.

Another spiritual sacrifice is to actually love each other. Loving each other can be a sacrifice, especially the annoying ones, especially the ones who don't appear to love us very much. God wants a temple built on love, and when the other person doesn't love you very much, loving them is a sacrifice. It's a good sacrifice. You can’t build church if you don't love your brother. And perhaps he won't start loving you until he sees that you love him.

Hebrews 13:15-16
Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise – the fruit of lips that openly profess his name. And do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased.

When we quote Paul by saying that we're not under law but under grace, we're absolutely right. We're not saved by doing the right things or offering the right sacrifices. We do the right thing and offer the right sacrifices because we're saved. We offer sacrifices because we're grateful to God the Father, the Creator, the Owner, who has redeemed us from death and filled us with the Holy Spirit.

Romans 12:1-2
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.

If you're a Christian, God owns you. Every human on planet earth is a slave. Either you're a slave to sin, or you're a slave to Jesus. I know which I'd rather be. But if you're a slave to Jesus, He gets to decide how you spend your time. Let's not give God the scrag end of our lives, the bits and pieces, the diseased attitudes and worship, the five minutes here and ten minutes there of our day. Let's not decide to love the brothers and sisters who are nice to us, and neglect the ones who aren't. Let's not just worship Him when we feel like it, and stay home when we don't.

And let's not only worship God when it's safe to do so.