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Malachi’s fifth disputation begins with a theological lesson: “For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, have not perished” (3:6). The “children of Jacob” is one of the Bible’s epithets for the chosen people. Like “Abraham’s seed,” the label highlights the foundation of their national story through the patriarchs. Malachi’s point was that God’s safeguarding of the people was not because of their national strength or resourcefulness. God had spared them from destruction because of his enduring mercy. The problems confronting the restored community were not the fault of God. He had remained constant throughout Israel’s history and was faithful to the covenant promises.
Malachi wanted to clarify that the people’s latest unfaithfulness was not unique. God declared, “ever since the days of your ancestors you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them” (3:7). In contrast to God’s immutability, the people’s rebellious hearts were as predictable as the tides, ebbing and flowing with each generation. The restored community had fallen into a spiritual malaise, just as their forefathers had, before them.
Clarion call
From Hosea to Malachi, the prophets repeat the clarion call: “Return to me, and I will return to you” (3:7). Implicit in God’s call to return was the guarantee that if the people’s repentance was genuine, he would restore what they had lost, and they would once again delight in their covenant relationship. Jesus’s parable of the Prodigal Son was a new spin on an age-old appeal.
Though Yahweh promised forgiveness as a reward for repentance, the opposite was true for the unrepentant. Yahweh had warned the first generations of Israelites that if the people continued to rebel against him, he would turn his face from them (Deut. 31:17). The prophet Isaiah had warned his contemporaries that their iniquities had raised barriers between them and God. The turning of God’s face meant he did not hear their prayers: “your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear” (Isa. 59:2).
If you are following the Lord, you can understand the sheer terror of the thought of God turning his face from you. Every believer’s desire is summarized in the Aaronic blessing: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace” (Num. 6:24-26). I pray this blessing over my children every night. We are well-acquainted with the Aaronic blessing, but the verse that follows it is not as familiar. God tells the priests that blessing the Israelites in this way puts God’s holy name on the people (Num. 6:27).
Putting an end to the separation between God and humans was the divine plan. For hundreds of years, God had sent the prophets to remind the people that he was willing and ready to reengage with all of them, even the most wayward followers. They merely had to repent and recommit to him. The prophet Jeremiah, even on the verge of the Babylonian invasion, had promised that if the people repented, God would heal their unbelief (Jer. 3:22).
However, those who are not seeking God rarely notice when God withdraws. They are too self-deceived. Malachi’s contemporaries asked him, “how shall we return?” (3:7). By itself, the tone of the question is unknown. Were they denying guilt or feigning innocence? Or were they honestly dumbfounded as to why God was blaming them? Lack of spiritual depth is evident in the people’s counter-questions in Malachi. They were not taking the initiative to evaluate their priorities, and their blind spots made them spiritually insensitive.
Withholding tithes
In the last disputation, God inventoried the general sins of the community (3:5). He called out the priests for negligent temple service and the Israelite men for divorcing their wives. At this point in Malachi, naming additional sins feels exhausting. However, God provided a new and specific example of their failings as a community. He addressed the people without mincing words: “Will anyone rob God? Yet you are robbing me!” (3:8).
They were robbing God by withholding their tithes and offerings. God bluntly said, “you are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me—the whole nation of you!” (3:9). The Hebrew verb suggests the people were neglecting the tithe as a general practice. Because they perceived God as a powerless deity, they withheld their tithes and offerings, expecting no consequence.
For an agrarian society, giving a tithe meant putting aside one-tenth of their produce as “holy to the Lord” (Lev. 27:30). Tithing became part of their covenant responsibility; it was also an act of worship. When Jacob awoke from his dream of angels ascending and descending a ladder, he had promised God a tenth of his wealth out of a compulsion for praise (Gen. 28:22).
Tithes were common among the nations surrounding Israel in the ancient Near East. They were used to fund religious and political institutions. Even if the Israelites were out of practice and their priests were insufficient, they knew this decree. Ignorance was not their excuse.
How was withholding the tithe robbing God, the one “for whom and through whom all things exist” (Heb. 2:10)? Theologically, no one can rob the creator God of the Bible. Unlike pagan gods, he doesn’t depend on humans for food and sustenance. Malachi’s point was that failing to tithe was failing to recognize that the earth and everything in it belonged to God (Ps. 24:1). Before the people had first entered Canaan, God had instructed them that the land belonged to him; he was freely loaning it to the people (Lev. 25:23). Tithing the land’s produce displayed their gratitude.
The people were required to give a tenth of the harvest to God, but enforcing it was difficult. However, when they were cheating the system by bringing defective animals to sacrifice at the temple, their deception was on display (1:14). Tithing was an honor system, and therefore it was much easier to skimp without the knowledge of the priests. Perhaps because inadequate tithing was an unseen sin, God clarified that the people were robbing him directly. God was the only one privy to their selfishness.
In the introduction to the section on Malachi’s dating, I pointed out how the corresponding complaints in Nehemiah and Malachi link the two books in time. Withholding of tithes was a problem for Nehemiah’s audience, as well. After Nehemiah’s term in Susa, he had returned to Israel, only to find that the people were neglecting the temple tithe (Neh. 10:37-39; 12:44; 13:5-13). Malachi may have ministered to the people during Nehemiah’s absence in Susa. His oracle paved the way for Nehemiah’s reforms when he returned.
Nehemiah worried about the Levites, because the produce from the tithes were their only means of support (Deut. 12:5-19; 14:22-29). A percentage of the offerings, either from the produce or from the animal sacrifices, was their payment for their temple services. The Levites were expected to spend their time serving at the temple, performing sacrifices, and teaching the law. Their sustenance came from the tithes, at least ideally. When the system failed, the priests went hungry.
Nehemiah had witnessed the priests leaving their temple duties to go work the fields for food (Neh. 13:10). He confronted all the officials, asking them, “Why is the house of God forsaken?” (Neh. 13:11). The people responded to Nehemiah by bringing their tithe of grains, wine, and oil to make things right.
Malachi claims, in his first disputation, that the priests had conspired to sacrifice defective animals in violation of the laws of sacrifice. With the extra insight from Malachi’s fifth disputation, perhaps the priests were accepting the defective animals because they needed the food! The owners of the defective animals could not sell them or breed them, but they were still fine to eat. The issue was God’s absence in the arrangement. The focus of both the priests and the worshipers was on themselves, not God. The worshipers desired a cheap sacrifice, and the priests wanted a meal.
Misusing Malachi
Malachi laid out God’s straightforward instructions for how the community could get back on track. The people must “bring the full tithe into the storehouse” (3:10). The full tithe required complete cooperation and no withholding of God’s due. Somewhere on the temple complex was a storehouse for grains, wine, and oil. If the people would stop their habitual sin and fill the storehouse with their tithes, God promised to “open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you an overflowing blessing” (3:10).
God invited the people to “test” the reliability of his promise. He knew that what he was asking was difficult for hungry people. If their food was already scarce, they would struggle to give freely. If they corrected their behavior, however, he would reward them with more than they could manage.
Prosperity gospel preachers often quote Malachi’s promise of “overflowing blessing,” and indeed, it is a beautiful assurance of God’s power when he takes pleasure in his people. Prosperity gospel sermons include “opening the gates of heaven,” but they leave out the latter promise in which God said he would “rebuke the locust for you, so that it will not destroy the produce of your soil” (3:11). Malachi, like all the prophets, referred frequently to the blessings and curses laid out in Deuteronomy and Leviticus, in relation to keeping the covenant. He was not inventing a new system of blessings and curses. Instead, he was reinforcing what the community already understood. These promises were rooted in the language of agriculture. God had promised that obedience would bring abundant harvests, and disobedience would lead to drought and locusts (Deut. 28:38-39).
God was not promising wealth to individual people, and he certainly was not promising that tithing would earn believers a new car or pay their mortgage. His assurances related to the entire community. He meant for them all to benefit together from the land’s bounty.
The surrounding nations, like Israel, connected rainfall to prosperity and divine blessing. If God lifted the curse and the rains returned to Israel and ended her drought, the prophet promised, “all nations will count you happy” (3:11). When the land was once again a delight in the eyes of the Lord, it would be a delight in the eyes of all. The nations would take notice of God’s favor, and the bounty of the harvest would be proof that God had accepted their repentance.
For American Christians, tithing is an uncomfortable subject, but the tithe is one method of worship that was passed down from Jewish to Christian tradition. Although the system for tithes and offerings was changed in the New Testament, the principle behind it remains the same. In the Corinthian church, Christians gathered a “collection for the saints” and sent the donations to poor believers in Jerusalem (1 Cor. 16:1). Just as the early believers gave “voluntarily” and “according to their means” (2 Cor. 8:3), so should we.
Because the message of Malachi is often misused, I want to remind readers that the gospel message is not a promise of material wealth, but of spiritual blessings. Any presentation of the gospel as materialistically rewarding is a distortion of the truth. Paul wrote, “For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). Our giving and caring for each other is not transactional, but rather, it is based on gratitude to God (James 1:17).