Bringing God less than the best (Malachi 1)

In Malachi chapter 1, God pointed out a major problem with the worship that the people of God were bringing to him. The people of Judah had returned to their homeland after many years in exile. They had rebuilt the temple and the walls of Jerusalem and had resumed the worship required in the law of Moses. This meant that they were bringing the animals for sacrifice at the right times as God had prescribed for them.

The animals that were to be brought for sacrifice were very costly. We have some idea about how expensive meat is in the supermarket, but animals have always been expensive to raise. They cost a lot to feed and take a long time to grow. Most people back then didn’t eat meat anywhere near as regularly as we do today; meat was a special occasion kind of food. And the returned exiles were small in number and not exactly prosperous.

All of this led the people to bring animals for sacrifice that were less than perfect. Some of them were blind, others were lame, others had even been stolen from other people. God was furious with them for this. This broke the law which required perfect animals without blemish, pointing to the future Lamb of God (Jesus) who would be perfect and without sin. And it revealed a great deal about their hearts. They did the religious things expected, but they didn’t give of their best. They gave the rest, the leftovers, the second-best options.

Think about it. If you had a flock of sheep, and time came to sacrifice one, you would know that God wanted the best one. Yet the best one would sell for much more than that one that has a few problems. And, after all, the sacrificed sheep was only going to be burnt up or fed to the priests anyway. Surely no-one really cared if it wasn’t quite ideal.

God cared a great deal. The language in Malachi 1 is not ‘please try a little harder’. God compared their offerings to bringing a gift to their Persian governor. If you were to bring a gift to an important person, you would bring something of great value. Their bringing damaged gifts to God showed what they thought about God. He was not worthy of their best in their minds.

This might be an ancient issue, but it has very modern applications for us. All of us have limited money and resources and skills and time. We all decide how we are to use these things. What drives our choices? Most Christians would say that we put God first in our lives; is that something we see consistently in practice?

Perhaps it has been a harder month financially than normal, with some large bills or less income. What loses out? Our luxuries or our support of our local church?

Perhaps we are asked to serve our church or help a fellow Christian in some way. Yet we’re busy with work and family responsibilities. Do we always put this off? I’ll serve more when I’m less busy, we tell ourselves. Yet that mystical less busy time never seems to come.

We don’t want to give God the leftovers. If God is the most important Person in our lives, that should be obvious. We should make time to serve in the local church. Our giving should be the first thing that comes from our budget. We should be keen to use our talents to build others up, not only to make more money.

This is challenging for all of us. Let’s not fall into the trap of the returned exiles of Malachi. Let’s give God the best, not the rest.