Scripture Reading: Mal. 3:1-3; 4:1-3
The book of Malachi is on Christ directly. In this message I have the burden to give a further word on the revelation of Christ in Malachi.
The book of Malachi reveals Christ in His first coming and in His second coming. In His first coming He is the Messenger of God. As the Messenger of God, Christ not only brings a word or a message from God to God’s people; He Himself is the living message. This is fully proved by the four Gospels, which are a complete and perfect record of Christ as the living message sent by God to His chosen people. While the Lord Jesus was living on earth, as He traveled through the cities and as He spoke to the people, ministering Himself into the intrinsic part of their being, He Himself was the message.
In His second coming, Christ will be the Angel of the covenant, the Desire of nations (3:1), and the Sun of righteousness (4:2). Actually, Christ was the Angel of the covenant even in His first coming. As the Angel of the covenant, Christ enacted the new covenant. Before going to the cross, the last thing He did was to establish the new covenant at His table (Matt. 26:26-30).
Based upon this new covenant (Heb. 8:10-12), we are forgiven by God, who even forgets our failures. God is then able to dispense Himself into our intrinsic being to be our life, to be the law of life, and to be everything to us as our inward content that we may live Him. This means that the new covenant is to make us absolutely one with God. He becomes us, and we, being constituted with Him, are one with Him in His life and nature. The New Testament reveals that He and we form a mutual abode (John 14:20, 23). What a miracle this is!
We need to have the proper understanding of what it means to say that God has been constituted into us to become us and that we have become one with God in His life and nature. The New Testament reveals that God is our Father and that we are His sons. We are not sons who have been adopted by God but sons who have been born of God. God is our Father because He has begotten us, and we are His sons because we have been born of Him. Just as a child shares the life and nature of his father but not the fatherhood, so we as sons born of God share God’s life and nature but not His fatherhood nor His Godhead. We are the same as God our Father in life and nature, but we surely are not God in His Godhead or the Father in His fatherhood. This is the intrinsic revelation of the Bible, especially of the New Testament.
In our daily living, we need to remember our status as sons of God possessing the life and nature of God. For example, if a brother and his wife both realize this, knowing that they are not only human but also divine, they will respect each other to the uttermost. Instead of disputing, they will honor each other and be kind to each other. Also, this realization will keep them from losing their temper. When we are tempted to lose our temper, we need to remember that we are sons of God. Even in such a matter as shopping in a department store, we should not forget our status as sons of God.
In His second coming, Christ will also be the Desire of the nations (Mal. 3:1; Hag. 2:7). Christ is the One whom we desire. Day by day we desire Him to be our love, our humility, our meekness, and our joy. Nothing is better than joy. This joy becomes our strength, our healing, our feeding, and our nourishment. Real joy comes from Christ being our life, our virtues, and our everything. I can testify that I have been loving this One for over seventy years, and I love Him today much more than ever. Daily I desire Him, love Him, and consider Him. He surely is our Desire.
As the Sun of righteousness, Christ will come with healing in His wings (Mal. 4:2). Today the Pentecostal people practice what is called divine healing. Actually, Christ Himself is our healing. He is the Sun that heals us as it shines upon us.
In His first coming, the earth rejected Christ; therefore, the earth lacks His healing. But because we have received Him in a secret, hidden way, we receive His healing every day. His healing causes us to have joy so that we forget our anger and anxiety. We are sick from sin, death, and many deficiencies and imperfections. Only this healing Christ can make us whole. To be healed is to be saved. To be healed, to be saved, is to be made whole. He will heal us, but we must give Him the freedom to use His wings to fly above us, around us, and within us.
In His first coming, Christ healed the degraded priesthood, but in His second coming, He will heal the remnant of the people of Israel. Then He will be everything to the earth and to us. This healing Christ will come suddenly. Thus, we need to be alert, ready to receive Him.
The center of the book of Malachi is the healing Christ. This healing Christ is the Messenger of God, the Angel of the covenant, and the Desire of the nations. Christ’s being our healing is based upon His being the Sun of righteousness. The word “Sun” indicates life, and the word “righteousness” indicates justice. The whole earth is filled with death and injustice, but with the healing Christ we have life and justice. We are waiting for Him to come as the Sun of righteousness with healing in His wings.
