Malachi Chapter Two, Wearying God

 

Malachi 2:17 You have wearied the LORD with your words; yet you say, “In what way have we wearied Him?” In that you say, “Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the LORD, and He delights in them,” or, “Where is the God of justice?”

 

Verse 17 reverts to the question and answer format Malachi employed through chapter one, where Yahweh states a grievance, and Israel collectively replies with a question, permitting an embellished answer. The grievance in particular is how Judah has wearied God. Can God be wearied? Not in the sense that you and I can become weary. Fatigue is normal to the human condition. But God does tells us that His Spirit will not always strive with men because of their frailty. The human constitution is ephemeral; we live like grass quickly withered and gone. Scripture says of the nature of man, “Do not put your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His spirit departs, he returns to his earth; in that very day his plans perish…sever yourselves from such a man, whose breath is in his nostrils; for of what account is he?” Psalm 146:3, Isaiah 2:22.

God grows wearied by human vanity. Our pride exalts us to contend with our Maker. We delight in turning evil into good and extolling the Edenic lie: “Has God said…?” When we behave a certain way toward God, He in turn conducts Himself according to His character and word. God is unchanging and incapable of anything less than perfection. Therefore when fallible men backslide or apostatize from the faith, He must contend with us according to who He is. Emotions such as regret or weariness (defined humanly) are not possible for Him. Regret implies error; weariness suggests being worn out, or reaching one’s limit. The prophet selected a word to liken God’s vexation toward stubborn Israel’s chronic backsliding.

 

An overview of Leviticus chapter 26 is a very good example of God’s constant walk, and how the direction we choose to take (walking with or contrary to Him) determines how He addresses us. For brevity’s sake I will cite the passages that demonstrate this provision, which is dependent entirely on where we are circumstantially with God. After God briefly summarized the various commandments He ordered Israel to follow He outlines a chain of cause and effect. The chapter’s blessings and curses hang on four important words: “If you…then I,” Leviticus 26:3, 4. “If” is the joint on which this entire chapter pivots. It involves attitude, action, and choice. If Israel does this, then God will do that for blessing or for cursing. What follows is a list of similar terminology as God lays out the path to blessing and the road to ruin. Both bear painfully clear reasons why they occur so Israel has no reason to wonder how events (good or bad) came to pass. Whereas verses 3 through 13 invite blessing, verses 14 through 39 warn of calamity, while verses 40 through 45 recall the covenant through reconciliation. At each fork in this provisional road God expresses His person and will differently. “With the merciful You will show Yourself merciful; with the blameless man You will show Yourself blameless; with the pure You will show Yourself pure; and with the devious You will show Yourself shrewd,” Psalm 18:25, 26.

 

Another example can be found in Genesis. When the wickedness of humanity had reached a fever pitch, it is told us, “And the Lord was sorry that He made man on the earth, and was grieved in His heart. So the Lord said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them,” Genesis 6:6, 7. While this passage seems to suggest God genuinely regretted making mankind, i.e. He had made a mistake from human perspective. But the divine will toward man changed since mankind, in universal rebellion toward Him, had changed first. I suppose we might call this the “Leviticus Principle.” “And after all this, if you do not obey Me, but walk contrary to Me, then I also will walk contrary to you in fury,” Leviticus 26:27, 28. God had given the government of the world to Adam as his vice-regent. Adam’s sons through Cain had broken all restraint until, “all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth,” Genesis 6:12. God, in righteous judgment, “did not spare the ancient world…bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly…the Lord knows how to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment,” 2 Peter 2:5, 9. The antediluvian peoples rejected atonement on the altar (Genesis 4:4, Hebrews 11:4), doing despite to the Spirit of grace. Having grieved the Holy Spirit only judgment remained. In this sense, “God was sorry” (or grieved) since He does not want any to perish, but all to come to the knowledge of the truth.