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Malachi Chapter One

1. The Lord’s oracle/burden begins with a declaration of His love for Israel (Mal. 1:2a).
   1. Israel does not have the capacity to understand or appreciate the Lord’s love (Mal. 1:2b).
   2. The Lord’s love was an unconditional love (Mal. 1:2c; Rom. 9:10-13).
2. The Lord’s oracle/burden continues with an accusation against Israel—their priests despise His name (Mal. 1:6b).
   1. As their Father and Master He does not receive any honor or fear from His people (Mal. 1:6a).
   2. Again, Israel does not have the capacity to understand why their carnality was a despisement of the Lord (Mal. 1:6c).
   3. The Lord also explained that Israel was despising His name by their fraudulent and cheapskate offerings (Mal. 1:7-10).
   4. The Lord promised a coming day when His name will be magnified, & His offerings will be awesome (Mal. 1:11-12).
3. The entire apostasy of Malachi’s day is described as a spiritual fatigue (Mal. 1:13-14).

Malachi Chapter Two

1. The Lord’s oracle/burden follows the accusation of Chapter One with a warning in Chapter Two (Mal. 2:1-9).
   1. They are already under Divine discipline (curse) (Mal. 2:2), but that Divine discipline will progress to fecal disposal (Mal. 2:3).
   2. The warning charges the priests of Malachi’s day to imitate the Levites of Moses’ day (Mal. 2:4-7).
   3. The warning recognizes that their failure was leading the people astray (Mal. 2:8-9).

(Chapter Two continues tomorrow)

Nehemiah Chapter Thirteen

(NOTE: Rhodes: Neh 12:27-13:31; 5:14-19)

1. Chapter 13 takes place years after the events of chapters 1-12.
2. Nehemiah completed his term as governor, and returned to Persia.  After an unknown period of time, he returned to Jerusalem and found more evil at work (Neh. 13:1-9).
   1. Tobiah the Ammonite (Neh. 2:10) had been given chambers within the temple (Neh. 13:4-5).
   2. When Nehemiah found out about it, he threw Tobiah out of the temple (Neh. 13:8-9).
3. Nehemiah also discovered that the Levites were working outside jobs to support themselves because they were not being supported by the tithes and offerings (Neh. 13:10-14).
4. Nehemiah also put an end to the Sabbath violations that he observed (Neh. 13:15-22).
5. The mixed marriage snare was also becoming prevalent once again (Neh. 13:23-29).
6. Other seemingly basic tasks were being neglected without Nehemiah’s spiritual leadership (Neh. 13:30-31).