Sunday Sermon II--The Broken Covenant

The Broken Covenant
Mal 2:10-16

Introductory Thoughts
· Families, perhaps especially Christian families, are going through an onslaught from inside and out.
· Lives are being destroyed and altered by this collapse of families
· Drugs, the sex culture, internet pornography, and dozens of talk shows spreading lies about men, women, and families—all are attacking the family.
· The very meanings of “Manhood” and “Womanhood” are in doubt.
· Some very good people are trying to start a movement for Covenant Marriage. Now, this is a great idea, but the fact that it is needed shows how far down things have gone. A marriage IS a covenant, as we will see.
· Malachi’s day was such a time as this
· I know that divorced has touched at least half of the people here. I do not seek to put anyone down, only to warn you
· You need to carefully consider what God says about this broken covenant and to listen, not to your own desires, fears, prejudices, or beliefs, but to what God has to say about this topic.

· What is A Covenant?

a. Hebrew—“covenant” is beriyth, (“a cut”) and to make a covenant is karath beriyth, (“to cut a cut”)—Gen 15:18
b. Greek—1242. diatheke—“…man can never negotiate with God or change the terms of the covenant: he can only accept them or reject them…[the Bible]…did not use the ordinary Greek word for contracts or agreements in which both parties were equal…but rather chose a less common word, diatheke, which emphasized that the provisions of the covenant were laid down by one of the parties only. ATR
(1) God ordains Covenants—Gen 6:18, 9:9
(2) God Defines Covenants: their application, their scope
(3) God sets the rules for every covenant—

c. Marriage IS a covenant.
(1) It is called a covenant—Mal 2 and Prov 2:16-17
(2) Marriage is God ordained (Genesis 2:18-25)
(3) Marriage is God defined—Gen 1:26-28, 2:24-25
(4) Marriage is God Governed—Genesis 2:24, Mat 19:4-6, Eph 5:21-33, 1 Pet 3:1-7, Heb 13:4, etc.
(5) Marriage is a picture of the New Covenant, and therefore is to be permanent—Eph 5:25-32, Mat 19:6
(6) The New Covenant began in time the moment that Christ died, and will never end. It is called “the everlasting Covenant,” Heb 13:20. Since the marriage covenant is intended to be a picture of the relationship between Christ and the church, marriage is supposed to be everlasting.

2. What God Had Given Israel

a. God’s Creation Ordinances—Mal 2:10 “…Have we not all one Father? Has not one God created us?”
(1) Made in God’s image—Gen 1:26-27
(2) Made to fill the earth—Gen 1:28
(3) Made to live as one man and one woman, the two becoming one—Gen 1:27, 2:18-25
(4) Before prayer, before worship, before the written Word, before any organized body of faith, God instituted marriage.

b. The Covenant of the Fathers—probably the covenant with Abraham. In the Old Testament, God set up an institution of marriage so that the covenants of Promise could be carried on from generation to generation by children set apart unto the LORD. Mal 2:14 “…she is your companion And your wife by covenant. 15 But did He not make them one, Having a remnant of the Spirit? And why one? He seeks godly offspring.”
(1) A Covenant Wife
(2) A Completer and companion
(3) The oneness of this marriage was intentional—God could have made Adam two, three, or four wives—God made one
(4) Goal—Godly seed to inherit the Promise

3. What Israel had Done—Mal 2:11 "Judah has dealt treacherously, And an abomination has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem, For Judah has profaned The Lord's holy institution which He loves: He has married the daughter of a foreign god."

a. The men were discarding their holy Hebrew first wives in favor of young, hot pagan women!
b. They had committed treason against God!

(1) The same phrase is used five times
Mal 2:10 "… Why do we deal treacherously…”
Mal 2:11 “…11 Judah has dealt treacherously…”
Mal 2:14 "… the wife of your youth, With whom you have dealt treacherously..”
Mal 2:15 “…let none deal treacherously with the wife of his youth…”
Mal 2:16 “…take heed to your spirit, That you do not deal treacherously."

(2) What does the word mean? Unfaithfulness, even treason, against God.
(a) Treason against His creation ordinance
(b) Against His Holy institution of marriage
(c) Treason against His Covenant
(d) Treason against the very children their wives had borne them.

c. Profaning the Holy
(1) By an Abomination—This is a very powerful word, used of:
(a) Idol Worship—Dt 7:25
(b) Human sacrifice (Dt 12:31)
(c) Engaging in the occult (Dt 18:9-14)
(d) Practicing ritual prostitution (1 Kings 14:23f)
(e) Homosexuality and other sexual perversions (Lev 18:22-30, 20:13)
(f) And the seven things that God hates (Prov 6:16-19)
(2) This abomination consisted of marrying pagan women, which will lead to all of the above and more.
(3) By Profaning —dishonoring—the Lord’s “Holy”—it could be His name, or better yet, the very institution of marriage that He had ordained.

d. Doing violence to their wives—not necessarily physical
(1) Caused the wives to cry so much that the altar was said to be covered with tears (Barnes, Gill)
(2) Broken the covenant of marriage with their wives
(3) “Covered themselves with violence…” Mal 2:16 (N L T) “…I hate divorce!” says the LORD, the God of Israel. “It is as cruel as putting on a victim’s bloodstained coat,” says the LORD Almighty.”
(4) It is like they had brutally cut their wives to pieces and then put on the coat of the victim like some sick trophy of a serial killer.

e. Doing permanent damage to their children—how can offspring grow up Godly in the face of these abominations? By God’s grace, it can happen, but these crimes and abominations make it a rough row to hoe.
f. The ultimate hypocrisy unveiled—they were attending worship the whole time.

4. The Consequences of their sins

a. Broken Fellowship with God
(1) The prophet cries that they should be cut off—kicked out—of the camp of Israel—there is an important play on words here. To make a covenant was to “cut a cut” or karath berith, This phrase here says the offender should be cut (karath) off from the Covenant people.
(2) “Awake and aware,” is a Hebrew saying referring to the old times in the desert, when the one on guard at night (Awake) would warn the ones sleeping (Aware, i.e., make them aware) of impending danger. In the time of Malachi, it referred to scholar and student or priest and parishioner. (Barnes, Gill).
(a) The priests and the people they misled
(b) All classes were guilty of this crime

b. God as a witness against them—2:14 èJames 4:6 "God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble."
c. A heritage in jeopardy—what of the Godly offspring now?

5. Applications for Today
a. Far too many people take divorce too lightly.
(1) I am not saying that divorce is never an option in a practical sense—in cases of extreme violence and substance abuse, etc., when legal protection for a family is needed. But while this happens, this is not usually the case.
(2) Sometimes, the unbeliever leaves: 1 Cor 7:15 But the Bible has no provision for two believers divorcing.

b. What are the effects of the broken covenant today?
(1) The children learn that nothing is permanent.
(2) The children follow the example—they give their heart too soon, and they break up and go on, break up and go on, and by the time they are married, their hearts have become hard and ready to break up for real.
(3) The witness of the church is damaged
(4) Those who break it blandly without any repentance, nor any thought of the greatness of the sin, find themselves cut off from God’s presence, and they wonder why?
(5) They need to read Malachi.

b. The Ray of Hope—the prophecy of the Messiah—Mal 3:1-4
When Jesus comes into the situation, He can turn it all around—today might be the very day to do so