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What Priests Are Supposed to Do

1. Text: Mal. 2:1-9.

2. When God conferred the priesthood on the family of Aaron, He assigned vital responsibilities to them.

3. Their duties may be put under three headings:

   1. Officiating in the various rituals of the temple service - Lev. 21:6.

   2. Instructing the nation in the Law of Moses - Lev. 10:11.

   3. Adjudicating disputes over application of the law to specific cases - Deut. 17:8-11.

4. The priests were to play a critical role in seeing that Israel knew the Scriptures and worshiped properly.

   1. Their ministry would be a dominant influence upon the spiritual life of the nation.

   2. In short, the holiness God desired of His chosen people would depend heavily upon the exemplary character and function of the priests.

I. THE SINS OF THE PRIESTS IN MALACHI'S DAY

1. Unfortunately, at the end of OT history the Levitical priesthood was what it had often been since Sinai: corrupt, hypocritical, and a menace to the nation it was to have served.

2. Malachi's message contained a forceful rebuke and a plea for these priests to lead Israel in a renewal of its reverence for the Lord.

3. The sins of which the Lord's priests were guilty are nothing less than shocking:

   1. Refusing to reverence the Lord and despising His name - Mal. 1:6.

   2. Offering the blind, lame, sick, etc. as sacrifices - Mal. 1:7,8.

   3. Treating the altar as contemptible - Mal. 1:7,12.

   4. Treating the Lord's service as a wearisome drudgery - Mal. 1:13.

   5. Refusing to take the Lord's warning to heart - Mal. 2:1,2.

   6. Corrupting the priestly covenant of Levi - Mal. 2:4,5,8.

   7. Departing from the way of the Lord - Mal. 2:8,9.

   8. Causing the people to stumble at the law - Mal. 2:8.

   9. Showing partiality in the priestly functions - Mal. 2:9.

4. If the priests would not repent of these sins, Malachi warned of dire consequences:

   1. Among other things, God said, "[I will] spread refuse on your faces, the refuse of your solemn feasts; and one will take you away with it" (Mal. 2:3).

   2. The repugnance of the image of dung being smeared on the faces of the priests indicates the abominableness of their actions as God saw them.

   3. Also, God spoke of a punishment that had already begun: "I also have made you contemptible and base before all the people" (Mal. 2:9).

      1. The honor in which righteous priests were to be held had been forfeited -- these men deserved contempt and disrepute.

      2. This situation is full of irony: since they had shown disrespect to God in their efforts to court human popularity, God saw to it that their reward was not greater public acclaim, but public mockery.
         Cf. 1 Sam. 2:30.

II. THE APPLICATION TO US TODAY

1. These final OT warnings to the wayward priests of the "covenant of Levi" (Mal. 2:8) are set within the context of Malachi's messianic prophecy of a coming day when the "Messenger of the covenant" (Mal. 3:1) would "purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer to the Lord an offering in righteousness" (Mal. 3:3).

   1. Surely this is a reference to the spiritual priesthood of us today who are privileged "to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ" (1 Pt. 2:5).

   2. We are the very occupants of this purged and purified priesthood, having entered into it by the obedience of faith.

2. The honor and blessings of our priesthood far surpass those of the sons of Aaron.

3. But the greater honor also entails greater responsibilities -- and Malachi's message ought to probe our consciences. Cf. Hb. 2:1-3.

4. Are we doing any better with our priesthood than the Levites were with theirs?

III. WHAT GOD IS EXPECTING OF US

1. Malachi describes the function of our priesthood no less than that of the Levites when he says, "The lips of a priest should keep knowledge, and people should seek the law from his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts" (Mal. 2:7).

   1. The priest is "reverent" (Mal. 2:5).

   2. The "law of truth" is in his mouth (Mal. 2:6).

   3. "Injustice" is never found on his lips (Mal. 2:6).

   4. He walks with God "in peace and equity" (Mal. 2:6).

   5. He turns "many away from iniquity" (Mal. 2:6).

2. An important part of the priest's work, then, is to tell the people the will of God.

3. But woe to those priests who have had exactly the opposite influence and "have caused many to stumble at the law" (Mal. 2:8).

4. It is sobering to contemplate what must be God's full wrath against those whose ministry it is to represent Him to others, but who, in fact, have been the occasion of others turning their backs on Him.

Conclusion

1. There is no greater irreverence than that sometimes shown by the Lord's own people -- those whose very business it is to glorify the Lord!

2. The warning of Malachi gives no hope to priests (then and now) who, when admonished, "will not hear, and . . . will not take it to heart" (Mal. 2:2).

3. The obligation that rests upon each of us who is a Christian is to "adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things" (Tit. 2:10).

4. If we're failing to do that, the willingness to be warned may be the difference between heaven and hell.