CHAPTER ONE

 

 

1:1: “burden of the Word” = The Hebrew word used for “burden” is “massa,” and the insinuation cannot be overlooked, that being, “a heavy weight or load or cargo; an overwhelming problem; an incumbrance; an affliction; a millstone; a yoke.”  In the least sense it can mean “an inconvenience.”  The prophet is expressing the difficulties he will come across when attempting to address God’s Word to his fellow Israelites.

 

1:11: “My Name shall be great among the Gentiles. . . My Name shall be great among the heathen” = This became true in Matthew 12:18 & Luke 2:32, which was earlier prophesied by Isaiah in Isaiah 49:6.

 

1:14: “My Name is dreadful among the heathen” = God would have them notice that His “Name” is even acknowledged as requiring respect “among the heathen,” but not so among His supposed, before blessed, people.  My that testimony not be so among God’s servants today.

 

 

CHAPTER TWO

 

 

2:10: “one father” = Here is my Deuteronomy 6:4 Note:  Deuteronomy 6:4; Malachi 2:10; Matthew 12:29; Mark 12:32; John 10:30; Romans 3:30; First Corinthians 8:4, 6; Ephesians 4:5-6; First Timothy 2:5; James 2:19: “one” = The word “one” in Hebrew, “H259; echad,” means one in unity, not in quantity.  See Genesis 3:22.  Whereas the Hebrew word “yochid” means “the sense of absolute aloneness; one of a kind,” and is not used in the Scriptures or in Jewish literature or reference to God.  Compare also with Genesis 2:24.  Two persons with one purpose; one in the sense of seeking the same outcome.

 

 

CHAPTER THREE

 

 

3:1:  “shall suddenly come to His Temple” = Here is my Daniel 7:13 Note:  “the Son of Man came with the clouds of Heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days” = Take note that this is NOT the Second Coming of Christ, for He does not descend towards this earth, but moves “to the Ancient of Days.”  In other words, as we will discover in Daniel, Chapter 8, Christ moves from the Holy Place of the Heavenly Sanctuary, to the Most Holy Place.  This is also spelled out in Malachi 3:1.

 

3:2:  “fullers’ soap” = “Fuller’s soap makes a garment shrink into a much smaller compass.”  RH, April 23, 1901; GCB, April 8, 1901.

 

3:6:  “I change not” = See also Numbers 23:19; First Samuel 15:29; Psalm 89:34; 102:27; This Verse (Mal. 3:6); Hebrews 1:11-12; 13:8; James 1:17; First Peter 1:23.

 

3:8:  “rob God” = In regards to the legal systems definition of “steeling,” there are three (3) actions involved, i.e., Theft, Burglary, and Robbery.  Theft is steeling something that is out in the open; whereas Burglary is breaking into something and steeling what is hidden; while Robbery is steeling something from another in a personal, present, or on the spot manner.  Thus, God considers, “Will a man rob God,” in regards to His tithe, a personal matter.

 

“If they withhold that which belongs to God, He will afflict them in their families, and cause decrease in their possessions, just according to their disposition to rob Him.”  1SP:272.

 

“If they withhold that which belongs to God, He will afflict them in their families, and cause decrease in their possessions, just according to their disposition to rob Him.”  4aSG:7.

 

“God blesses the work of men’s hands, that they may return to Him His portion.”  PK:707.

 

“Many who give something are not blessed of God, because they do not give more.”  RH, January 4, 1881.

 

3:10:  “tithes” = See also Ecclesiastes 5:10.  See my Bible Study:  “TITHE, A PROPER BIBLICAL.”

 

“The contributions required of the Hebrews for religious and charitable purposes amounted to fully one-fourth of their income.”  PP:527.        

 

“pour you out a blessing” = How do we get any “blessing” from God?  By doing what He asks of us, i.e., by keeping His Commandments.

 

3:11:  “I will rebuke the devourer. . . he shall not destroy” = Notice the “he.”  This is not God that “destroy[s]” but Satan.  God allows Satan to work when we no longer want to be under His protection.

 

3:15-17:  “they that tempt God” = “Here is a company of disaffected professed Christians, whose chief business is to murmur, and complain, and accuse God by accusing the children of God.  They see nothing defective in themselves, but very much that is displeasing in others.”  RH, June 15, 1897; RH, December 21, 1897.

 

 

CHAPTER FOUR

 

 

4:2:  “Sun of righteousness arise with healing in His wings” = This is clearly a reference to Christ.  And if He is coming with “healing,” than this has reference to His Second Coming.

 

“grow up as calves of the stall” = See my Matthew 1:18 Note.  Such that they become fattened; being put there for that purpose.

 

From “John Gill’s Bible Commentary” we read:  “Bochart (Hierozoic. par. 1. l. 2. c. 31. col. 303) has proved, from many passages out of the Talmud, that the word which the Targum here makes use of, and answers to that in the Hebrew text, which is rendered ‘stall,’ signifies a yoke or collar, with which oxen or heifers were bound together, while they were threshing or treading out of corn; so that the calves or heifers here referred to were such as were not put up in a stall, but were yoked together, and employed in treading out the corn; now as there was a law that such should not be muzzled while they were thus employed, but might eat of the corn on the floor freely and plentifully, Deu. 25:4 these usually grew fat, and so were the choicest and most desirable, to which the allusion may be here, and in Jer. 46:21, Amos 6:4, and are a fit emblem of saints joined together in holy fellowship, walking together in all the Commandments and ordinances of the Lord; where they get spiritual food for their souls, and are in thriving circumstances; where they meet with the corn of Heaven, with that corn which makes the young men cheerful, and that bread which nourishes up to everlasting life.

 

“The apostle alludes to the custom of oxen yoked together, either in ploughing, or in treading out the corn, when he says, speaking of Church fellowship and communion in the ordinances of the Gospel, ‘be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers,’ 2Co. 6:14, for this hinders spiritual edification, as well as the promotion of the glory of God; but where they are equally yoked, and go hand in hand together in the work and ways of the Lord, they grow and flourish; they are comfortable in their souls, and lively in the exercise of grace; and they are the most thriving Christians, generally speaking, who are in Church communion, and most constantly attend the means of grace, and keep closest to the word and ordinances:  for the metaphor here used is designed to express a spiritual increase in all grace, and in the knowledge of Christ, and a growing up into Him in all things, through the use of means, the word and ordinances; whereby saints become fat and flourishing, being fed with the milk of the word, and the breasts of ordinances, and having fellowship with one another; and, above all, this spiritual growth is owing to the dews of the grace of God, the shining of the Sun of righteousness, and the comfortable gales of the south wind of the Spirit of God, which cause the spices to flow out.

 

“The Septuagint version, and those that follow it, render it, ‘ye shall leap’ or ‘skip as calves loosed from bonds;’ as such creatures well fed do when at liberty; and may denote the spiritual joy of the saints upon their being healed, or because of their secure, safe, and prosperous estate:  and so the word is explained in the Talmud, they shall delight themselves in it; and where the Rabbins interpret this and the preceding verse Mal. 4:1 of the natural sun in the firmament, which will be the hell in the world to come, and which will burn the wicked, and heal the righteous.”

 

4:3:  “ashes under the soles of your feet” = In line with verse 1, this is all that will be left of the wicked in the earth made new after the 1000-year period.  But just as the nail pierced hands of Christ show the Love for them throughout eternity, so the righteous remember them under their feet as to what they could have achieved.

 

4:4:  “the Law of Moses My servant, which I Commanded unto him in Horeb” = From “John Gill’s Bible Commentary” we read:  “for though the Law came by Moses, and is therefore called his, yet God was the Author and efficient cause of it; Moses was only a servant and minister; and this was given in Horeb, the same with Sinai:  these are names of one and the same mountain, at least of the parts of it; one part of it was called Horeb, from its being a dry desert and desolate place; and the other Sinai, from its bushes and brambles.  So, Jerome (in De locis Hebr. fol. 92. E.)states, ‘Horeb, the mountain of God, is in the land of Midian, by Mount Sinai, above Arabia in the wilderness, to which are joined the mountain and wilderness of the Saracens, called Pharan; but to me it seems the same mountain is called by two names, sometimes Sinai, and sometimes Horeb.’ ”

 

4:5:  “I will send you Elijah” = Will Elijah be reincarnated before Jesus returns to the earth?  Some think so on the basis of this verse.  But notice that Jesus commented in His day “that Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. . . then the disciples understood that He spake unto them of John the Baptist.”  Matthew 17:12-13.  Yet, even though Jesus said that John was Elijah, John vehemently denied it.  “And they asked him, what then?  Art thou Elias?  And he saith I am not.”  John 1:21.  This sounds most perplexing, doesn’t it? But now let us read two texts that will explain the riddle.

 

Even before his birth, it was prophesied of John, “And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God.  And he shall go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children.” Luke 1:16-17.  Instead of actually being Elijah, John’s work was to be in the “spirit and power of Elijah.”  Jesus completed the clarification when He said, concerning John’s ministry:  “And if ye will receive it this is Elias which was for to come.”  Matthew 11:14.  This makes it abundantly clear that John’s message was the Elijah message for his day, and was given in the spirit, power and boldness of Elijah.  Just before Jesus Comes then, another message of equal power is to be given to prepare God’s people for the Second Coming of our Lord.  See also Mark 9:11-13.