Turn Your Heart to God

Malachi 3:13-18 “Your words have been harsh against Me,” Says the Lord, “Yet you say, ‘What have we spoken against You?’ You have said, ‘It is useless to serve God;
What profit is it that we have kept His ordinance, and that we have walked as mourners
Before the Lord of hosts? So now we call the proud blessed, for those who do wickedness are raised up; They even tempt God and go free.’” Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another, and the Lord listened and heard them; so, a book of remembrance was written before Him for those who fear the Lord and who meditate on His name. “They shall be Mine,” says the Lord of hosts, “On the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him.” Then you shall again discern between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve Him.

This last Sunday, Pastor Kyle finished our Sunday sermon series through the books of the Minor Prophets with the third and fourth chapter of Malachi. He has heard frustrated people ask: “Why should I repent and follow God if it doesn’t do any good?” A fair question as nobody really wants no return for their efforts. It may feel like godless evildoers seem to prosper, but that is not the reality in a lost and fallen world. Creator God is on the throne, has authority and in control of human events and nature. Everyone will have to give an account of their life and accountable for their thoughts, words and actions, or the lack thereof according to His perfect Word, Will and Way. We desire justice, but forget that all fall short of the glory of God in sin and should, in repentance, truly desire mercy. We know this from Revelation 20:11-18 that justice comes; just not yet. 

Revelation 20:11-15 Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books. The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.

With the 1828 Webster’s dictionary definition of the word “good” being: “Having moral qualities best adapted to its design and use, or the qualities which God's law requires; virtuous; pious; religious; applied to persons, and opposed to bad, vitious, wicked, evil”, does our idea of “good” match. All of Christian life requires a daily act of remorseful repentance that needs to happen. We should ask our Creator God, “What part of our life is not in line with His Will for us?” 

Pastor Kyle presented three examples of what godly repentance looks like. (1) Godly Repentance is obedience while we sort out our internal questions. Being finite created beings, we do not see everything or have knowledge of the Divine purposes this side of eternity, so questions naturally happen in times of trials, tribulation and struggle of life. We need to honestly open up to the Lord about our circumstances and associated questions. By faith, we need to be able to say to the Lord, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24), while obediently placing our complete trust in God and follow Him – our Will aligned with His.

Let’s continue Pastor Kyle’s message on turning our heart to God in the next post.

In Christ, Brian