Come Follow Me 51
“I Have Loved You, Saith the Lord”
Introduction:
Malachi
means My messenger. What messages did the Lord give Malachi have for you? What
messages does he have for the world?
Do you trust that the Lord loves you even in adversity? You
should.
“I have loved you,” the Lord told His people
through the prophet Malachi. But the Israelites, who had suffered generations
of affliction and captivity, asked the Lord, “Wherein hast thou loved us?” (Malachi 1:2). After all Israel had been through, they may
have wondered whether the history of ancient Israel is really a story of God’s
love for His covenant people.
What evidences have
you seen in the Old Testament of God’s love for His people, and for you?
When the sons of
Jacob mistreated their brother Joseph, the Lord still prepared a way to save
them from famine (see Genesis 45:4–8). When Israel murmured in the wilderness, God
fed them with manna (see Exodus 16:1–4). Even when Israel abandoned Him, turned to
other gods, and were scattered, God never fully abandoned them but promised
that if they repented, He would gather and redeem them “with great mercies”
(see Isaiah 54:7).
Remember that God
loves both the repentant and the sinner. He invites all to repent and taste of
His mercy. His hand is reached out still to all of us, because He loves us.
The Old Testament is
a story of God’s patient, enduring love. And this story continues today. “The
Sun of Righteousness [will] arise with healing in his wings,” Malachi
prophesied (Malachi 4:2). Jesus Christ did come, bringing physical and
spiritual healing to all who come unto Him. He is the greatest evidence of
God’s love for ancient Israel and for all of us.
Malachi
Personal Study: “Return unto me,
and I will return unto you.”
The Church has now built many temples. What are
you doing to repair your relationship with the Lord?
Malachi 1:2 In what ways do you feel the Lord’s love in your life?
Malachi 1:6–11 Do I make offerings that honor the Lord?
Malachi 3:7 What can I do throughout 2023 to return unto the Lord? Specific ways.
Malachi 3:8–11 With the covenants you’ve made as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and within the walls of the temple, are you being honest with the Lord? Are you robbing Him in any way?
Malachi 3:13–15 Does your attitude towards the Lord during difficult times still reflect your love for and trust in Him.
As Many as I Love, I Rebuke and Chasten
Personal Study: The Lord
asks for “a pure offering.”
Are we giving the best and the first fruits, or are we withholding a pure offering from the Lord?
Leviticus 22:17–25 Do we make offerings of our own free will? Do we set aside for the Lord what we should be offering to Him? Do we give our best efforts in magnifying our callings and in ministering?
The Lord knows that we ourselves have blemishes, but He’d like us to reach up to Him for help and reach out to help others.
Malachi 3:3 The Lord wants His servants to become meek, lowly, and pure and to offer pure sacrifices. It is a process.
Moroni 7:5–14 Choose the things of God that invite and entice to do good continually.
Family Study: Wherein has the Lord loved us?
Malachi 1:2 List the ways that the Lord has loved you. Count your blessings.
https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/ot/mal/1?lang=eng
The Jews
despise the Lord by offering polluted bread upon the altar and by sacrificing
animals with blemishes—The Lord’s name will be great among the Gentiles.
Vs 6 Should we not honor and fear the Father and Master of all? If He
is God, let’s keep the first great commandment and love Him with all our
hearts.
Vs 7-8 Give your best gifts to the Lord; He does that for you.
Vs 11 Sometimes those without the more fullness of the gospel honor the
Lord better than we do.
https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/ot/mal/2?lang=eng
The
priests are reproved for not keeping their covenants and not teaching the
people—The Jews are condemned for dealing treacherously with one another and
with their wives.
Vs 7 Those who hold the Priesthood of God should honor Him and serve
Him and His people.
Vs 9 We cannot afford to be partial in the law.
Vs 10 Love your neighbor as yourself.
Vs 11-12 Marry in the covenant.
Vs 14 Adultery is wrong. Stay true to the wife of thy youth, the wife
of thy covenant.
Vs 16 Do not defile the Garment of the Holy Priesthood with adultery
and other evil.
Personal Study: Malachi’s prophecies are being fulfilled in
the latter days.
The messages of the linking together of the whole human family and the need to keep the law of tithing are crucial to our salvation and exaltation. The Lord has repeated them in each of our Standard Works of scripture.
Malachi 3–4 3; Nephi 24–25; Joseph Smith—History 1:36–39; Doctrine and Covenants 2
See also Doctrine and Covenants 27:9; 110:13–16; 128:17–18
What can you do personally to make sure that everything is not utterly wasted? Will you join the Lord’s cause? Will you invite others to come unto Him, so that they can receive the same blessings that you have been given? If the blessings aren’t made available to all, none of us can be made perfect.
Share your testimony of tithing; of missionary work; of the importance of families; of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ; of His work and His glory.
37 For behold, the day cometh that shall burn as an oven, and all the proud,
yea, and all that do wickedly shall burn as stubble; for they that come shall burn
them, saith the Lord of Hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.
38 And
again, he quoted the fifth verse thus: Behold, I will reveal unto you
the Priesthood, by the hand of Elijah the prophet, before the
coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
39 He
also quoted the next verse differently: And he shall plant in the hearts of the children the promises made to the fathers, and the hearts of the children shall turn to
their fathers. If it were not so, the whole earth would be utterly wasted at
his coming.
Satan is doing his best to destroy the family, gender, unity, and the linking
of generations. Too many despise themselves and feed into a lie that deception
is authenticity. It is not. It is cunning, evil deception.
It will be sad for anyone to be cut off from ancestors and descendants. Love
for family most begin with our family of origins and our created families of
husband, wife, and children. Then it most extend to our kindred dead and our
posterity through the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the receiving
of sacred saving ordinance performed for both the living and the dead. As long
as there are those who are living the gospel, preaching the gospel, and seeking
out their ancestors, performing in the temple their necessary ordinances, the
earth will not be wasted at the Lord’s coming. There will be those who are
left, preserved to assist in finishing this great work.
Doctrine and Covenants 110:13–16 The Keys of the Kingdom were restored to the earth. Elijah returned to initiate the work in our day. The Lord’s return is imminent and soon.
The Hearts of the Children Shall Turn
What does Elijah’s return mean to you? Robby’s mine, as are all my children. Also, I have more work to do in reaching out to my family across the generations and worlds.
Elijah appeared to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery
Personal Study: Paying tithing opens the windows of heaven.
Malachi 3:8–12 How has the Lord opened the windows of heaven to you? Do you need to clean your windows?
Family Study: Share
your thoughts and feelings about tithing.
What temporal and spiritual blessings have you seen in your life, which might be a result of paying tithing? The windows of heaven are clean? Do you need to clean or open your windows?
What does it mean to belong to the Lord or to be one of his jewels?
https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/ot/mal/3?lang=eng
The
Lord’s messenger will prepare the way for the Second Coming—The Lord will sit
in judgment—The people of Israel are commanded to pay tithes and offerings—They
keep a book of remembrance.
Vs 1 Each time you go to the
temple, are you prepared for the Lord coming there?
Vs 5 Our Righteous Judge
will execute righteous judgment.
Vs 7-12 Paying tithing is
one of the best ways for our land to be healed and for us to heal individually.
Vs 16-18 Is your name being written in the book of remembrance, as one who fears the Lord, loves Him, and hearkens?
Family Study: Malachi 4:5–6 Doctrine and Covenants 2
Who? What? When? Where? Why?
How do we turn our
hearts to our fathers? How are we blessed when we do?
Video: “The Promised
Blessings of Family History”
Multiple blessings are given to those who engage in family history and temple
work. Protection.
Obadiah 1:21 Will you
be an undershepherd for the Lord? Will you be a savior on Mount Zion?
Temple work (and
missionary work) is how we become saviors on Mount Zion.
What will we do as a
family to receive these blessings?
https://abn.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/ot/mal/4?lang=eng
At the
Second Coming, the proud and wicked will be burned as stubble—Elijah will
return before that great and dreadful day.
Vs 1-6 My job is to learn and know, to serve and grow. My job is to help my family and friends be true and to invite and reinvite all those that I can to come unto Christ.
Elijah was sent before this great time of spiritual deprivation and evil, in order to help us be endowed with the power that we need to remember our Father and our fathers (mothers too), and brothers and sisters.
If we adhere to the first two great commandments, we can invite others to come unto Christ and be perfected in Him through faith and repentance, baptism and receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost, and every other necessary ordinance for salvation and exaltation available to us through our Father's love and the Atoning Gift of His Son Jesus Christ.
Remember Them and turn to your family, Their family with love; and
return to them all.
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