Who is there among you that would even shut the doors? and ye would not kindle [fire] on mine altar for nothing. I have no delight in you, saith Jehovah of hosts, neither will I accept an oblation at your hand.
Malachi speaks to priests who kept the temple routine going: the doors, the altar fire, the animals. God says He would rather the doors stayed shut, which raises a question no routine can dodge: why do it, and will God accept it?
Another translation asks who among the priests would shut the temple doors for nothing — that is, without pay. On that reading, they had turned holy work into paid work, and the pay shaped what they offered.
In verse 10 He says, "It is not out of love to Me that you present offerings and shut the doors." The priests got the flesh. It was the portion of the Levites. Sometimes a priest saw a nice fat animal brought in and noticed a defect — maybe a blind eye. But he knew it would be just as good for him and his family to eat if it were blind. So he passed over the blind eye and offered the sacrifice. And God comes in and says, "You care for yourself, but what is due to Me you pass over..."
Who these men were makes it worse. Their office was a gift, and God already provided their support.
These sons of Aaron had fallen so low. They forgot the choice of grace that marked them out from their brothers and gave them the privilege of being the Lord's ministers. They now treated the work of their office only as a way to make money. What a contrast to the psalmist, who cries, "I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness." God Himself had provided for His priests. But they were not content to depend on Him. They wanted to extract their pay from their fellow men.
Commentators differ here. The wording of the verse above reads like a wish: someone should shut the doors so the altar fire is not lit in vain. One writer argues this is the true sense.
Verse 10 has often been interpreted to mean that the priests were greedy and demanded money for every little service, the opening of doors and the kindling of a fire. It has another meaning. The better rendering is, "Oh that some among you would even shut the doors of the temple." These are the doors that lead from the outer court into the holy part. The Lord declares it would be more profitable if they shut these doors and lit no more fire on the altar for nothing. In other words, He wishes the whole outward worship would stop.
Both readings end the same way: no pleasure, no accepted offering. God turns away the people, not only their gift. In Scripture, acceptance starts with the person and then reaches the sacrifice.
An altar needs a priest or an accepted worshipper. The Lord would not have directed the one if He had not provided the other. "And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering" (Genesis 4:4). His person was first accepted, and then his sacrifice.
The refusal is not God's last word. A promise about the nations follows, and one writer sees a pattern here that runs through Scripture.
Their spiritual condition has reached its climax. The Lord declares that He has no pleasure in them and would not accept an offering from their hands. This is the moment when He reveals His purposes of grace towards the Gentiles... These two things are always joined together in Scripture — the unbelief and turning away of the Jew, and the bringing in of the Gentile.
Commentators differ on when that promise comes true. One writer allows a present application, but reads the passage as still future.
But this very thing — His moral judgment of their evil — brings in, as prophecy always does, what God will do in His own gracious power... Many may apply it to what is going on now under the gospel; as a principle, that is allowable. But a closer look shows the passage looks on to the millennial day.
If God can decline an offering because of the motive behind it, the same test lands on anyone who serves Him now.
The moment I work for reward, it ceases to be Christian service. Christian service will be rewarded — it most certainly will. But so far as it is Christian service, we do it without any thought of reward. "The love of Christ," not the hope of reward, "controls us."
- Motive — No priest would shut the temple doors for free. Love of self, not love of the Lord, drove the service.
- Method — Once self is the motive, standards collapse. The animal with a blind eye was good enough for God because it was still good enough for the priest's table.
- Meaning — Commentators differ. Some read a rebuke of greed. Others read God wishing the doors shut and the empty routine stopped.
- Refusal — God turns away the people and their offering. Acceptance starts with the person, then the sacrifice, as with Abel.
- Reach — The rejected altar opens onto a promise of grace to the nations, which writers here tie to the coming kingdom.
For from the rising of the sun even unto its setting my name shall be great among the nations; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure oblation for my name shall be great among the nations, saith Jehovah of hosts.
Israel's priests were profaning God's name and insulting His worship. At that low point God announces a name that will be great from one end of the earth to the other. Two questions follow: when does this happen, and what is the "pure offering"?
The verse begins with "For," which ties it to Israel's failure. God does not abandon His name when His people dishonour it. He takes its care into His own hands.
But this very thing — the moral judgment of their evil — brings in what God will do in His own gracious power, as prophecy always does... For Israel was profaning His name and insulting His worship. Then Jehovah undertakes the care of it Himself. He declares that He will make His name great among the Gentiles whom the Jews despised. And He will do it everywhere, from nearby places to the most distant islands, which will wait for His law.
Another writer links this to Paul's argument in Romans.
Scripture always joins these two things together — the unbelief and turning away of the Jew, and the bringing in of the Gentile. The apostle explains it when he says, "Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." (Romans 11:25)
Commentators differ. Some say the promise is not yet fulfilled. They test it by looking at the world:
Is Jehovah's name great from one end of the earth to the other? Has not the great mass of the world remained, and does not a very large portion of it still remain heathen? The prophecy is clearly not yet fulfilled. It is no use claiming that the Gospel went out into all the world... The heart of the prophecy is not that the Gospel should go out. It is that Jehovah's name should be great everywhere among the Gentiles, and that is not so now.
Others allow a real present application while placing the literal fulfilment later.
The literal fulfilment of this will be in the world to come, when the nations will be blessed. But we can apply it to our position today, when Christianity moves forward mainly among the Gentiles. The Jewish nation turned aside and refused their Messiah... But here is the wonder of it: if they missed it, God has brought us Gentiles into such wonderful blessing.
"In every place" does not cancel Jerusalem. One writer holds both together:
The Jew will not be set aside, and will not set others aside. Instead, Jehovah goes out in His goodness to all the Gentiles. At the same time the mountain of His house stands at the top of the mountains, lifted above the hills, and the nations flow to it.
The verse names incense and an offering, so many have read it as a prediction of the Mass. One writer rejects that:
The Roman Catholic Church uses this passage as one of her proof texts for that abomination, the Mass. The official rulings of the Council of Trent say that "the Mass is that pure sacrifice which the Lord predicted by Malachi should be offered to His Name in every place."... It is true that the nations know the Name of the Lord. But no incense, sacrifice or offering belongs to the worship of the Lord in the true Church.
One writer names the offering, and gives the only application to the church:
The "pure offering" here is the Mincha, or grain offering. The only application of this text to the church is in a spiritual sense. Praise and thanksgiving do ascend to God through Christ, with the fragrance of His Person and work. They are offered by those who are cleansed from their sins in the precious blood of Christ, and so are "accepted in the Beloved." These, and acts of charity, are the sacrifices which the true priests of God offer to Him.
Israel's failure did not end the story. Neither does ours.
Satan's power, and the intrusion of the flesh and the world, ruined the testimony of God's ancient people. They have ruined the testimony of God's people today in the same way. Still, in the end God's purposes will prevail, whether for the earthly or the heavenly people. The glorious result will be that "the Lord will be magnified" and His name "will be great"... We shall be blessed, but He will be magnified.
- Name despised — Israel's priests profaned God's name and insulted His worship.
- Name defended — God takes the honour of His name into His own hands rather than letting human failure sink it.
- Name spread — from sunrise to sunset, to the nations Israel despised. Jerusalem still stands as the centre.
- Name misused — some read the "pure offering" as the Mass. Commentators reject that. For the church it means praise, thanksgiving and acts of charity.
- Name magnified — commentators differ on timing. They agree on the end: we are blessed, He is magnified.