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Because I believe so much in the commandment of scripture to "preach the Word" and that we need "all" of it, I keep a list of every sermon I preach along with the date and subject. Every so often, I look back at that list to make sure that I am not leaving anything in the Word of God out. If you come to this church, I want you to have the best chance of getting to heaven as possible and so I want to have preached all of the Word to you.

In preparing to preach this message, I went back and checked my titles of the last few years and it seems that unknowingly and with no premeditation, I have been preaching a series of sorts on "the dangers." This will be at least the fourth message that I have preached in two years that begins with "the danger of. . . " First, there was "the danger of having a good pastor." Then, there was "the danger of not winning souls." This year, I preached "the danger of distractions." And now we have "the danger of not giving God your best."

I'm completely sure why I have often come back to such a subject to preach a "warning from the Bible" but maybe it has to do with our human nature. We need warnings to stay alive. Some of them are a bit frivolous like that tag on your mattress that says "do not remove under penalty of the law." Nothing happens when you rip it off -- I tried it. That was five years ago and still no sirens and court sentences. And yet there are some warnings that I'm not going to buck up against and are thankful that they are there, like "bridge out ahead" and "toilet broken."

I read somewhere once about a rare disease in which people are born without the ability to feel pain. They interviewed this guy in Houston who has the disease and I was amazed by what the guy said. He told the interviewer that "when people first hear about it, they think that it would be great to not be able to feel pain, but that's not true, it's a horrible existence." Pain is the warning mechanism in your body to let it know that something is wrong. This guy has to constantly stop during athletic activities to check his entire body to make sure everything is okay. He has to go in for monthly bone scans and tests on his entire body. He has to have doctor checkups weekly because his body will not let him know if something were drastically wrong. Even something so much as bruising a toe is serious because he will permanently injure it because he doesn't know that he needs to be careful of it because he can't feel it. The interview ended with the guy saying "I'd give anything to be able to feel pain -- if you can, consider yourself blessed!" That's a different perspective isn't it!?

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The reason that I bring this up is that our text in Malachi was a warning to Israel that they had missed the danger signs of a bad spiritual disease in their lives. They were on the verge of being God rejects because of the progression of a sin that was destroying everything holy about them. They were guilty of the sin of not giving God their best.

Hopefully there is no one here that is quite as far a long on this devastating progression as Israel was, but to keep us from such a horrible place, I want to preach to you the warning signs of how they got to their spiritually destitute state. I want to point out the warning signs that they ignored or did not notice and make them so vividly clear that you will notice them in your own life. In the midst of preaching to these people, God interrupted to tell them this:

"My name will be great among the nations" is saying "I will turn from you, Israel, and turn to the Gentile nations of the world and allow them a revelation of my name and allow them to offer me the incense of praise, and allow them to offer me a sacrifice that is pure." Because Israel did not repent at this message and did not take note of the warning signs pointed out by God, then God turned to us, the Gentiles and brought us into the promised fold and into the place of blessing and today it is us who are offering ourselves as living sacrifices and the incense of praise and prayer to Him! Thank God for that, but that also means that the prophecies of Malachi are just as potent and applicable to us today as they were back then, because if we too ignore the warning signs of spiritual degradation, then we too, will end up in such a horrible state.

Some might say "well who would God turn to then?" But you'd better be careful with that kind of argument because Jesus said that He was able to raise up stones to be children of Abraham. God does not compromise on His Word and if He had to animate trees and rocks to serve Him in purity, He would do it. But as for me, I want to know the warning signs, because I've made up in my mind not to ever be replaced by a rock! Jesus died for me, not that rock, ain't no way that some stone head is going to out praise me!

But let's now turn to Malachi and see the great danger of the sin of not giving God your best. Keep in mind that Malachi's book is the writing down of messages that could have in some cases been weeks and months apart. As you travel through the book, you are getting a newer message that is being given to a people that did not heed what you read at first. We begin in verse 7 of our text:

God says, " You are presenting dirty and unclean food upon My altar," and the people immediately responded with "How is it dirty?" I want you to understand that if you and I could have been there to visually inspect the meal offerings of grain or corn or bread that these people were offering, you would have been unable with human eyes to find anything wrong with it. And that's why the people responded so adamantly with "How have we defiled You?" In other words, they are defensively saying "look at my offering, it is perfect." Their offering looked up to snuff and in the physical it definitley was and yet God said "it is defiled." Why? because "you say the table of the Lord is to be despised." In other words, you have no respect for the offering. In other words, there has been a loss of sincerity in your heart, and impure motives. God was saying "you are appearing to bring your best on the outside, but you are not bringing your offering with your best on the inside." God was judging the gift according to the motives of the giver!

These are early warning signs at best, but even this subtle sin is the starting place for a long road away from God. People never begin backsliding by bringing an outward second best offering, but rather by doing so inwardly. The spiritual deteriation begins when people bring second best mentally. The outward is always a sign of what the inward is like. And so when we see a sin or an attitude manifested on the outside of someone, that is the gradual product of something that started on the inside maybe even months or years ago!

In this message, I 'm talking more about just giving money, because Malachi's message applies to every area of service and offering that we give including time, mental energy, faith, everything. People don't just quit attending services faithfully in their body, until they have at least for a few weeks quit in their mind and spirit. Sometimes we think "so and so" doesn't come much any more. But the truth is that what we are seeing in the physical is evidence of a process that has been going on in that person's life for a while on the inside. Perhaps so and so began to get convicted by something that they resisted God on. And so the next time they came to church and God began to deal with them, the checked out mentally. We would say "they were here in person and they were offering their sacrifice of time." And we would be able to see nothing wrong there, but yet God could say "you are offering me a defiled sacrifice." "You are here because you are making an outward show of being here, but inside you motives are in tune with my Spirit."

There are people who go from being faithful praisers to quitting. But that quitting doesn't happen overnight, but rather somewhere along the way -- while still giving the outward sacrifice of praise -- they stopped giving it mentally and with their true heart. There are people who go from faithful tithers to not giving at all. But if we could examine it in the spirit, it begins with them still faithfully giving their tithes and yet not giving it cheerfully with their heart. There are people who stop praying and fasting, but you can always trace back in the spirit to a moment that only they and God know where prayer and fasting became an outward offering without the heart truly involved.

And so never forget that the first danger sign of not giving God your best is when you are being faithful in the outward offering and yet you are not loving God with your heart, soul, mind, and strength. When your inward passion and love ceases to be in your praise, then that is a danger sign that even though the outward looks to the onlooker as pure, yet the motives of the giver are making it unacceptable to God. God doesn't want mindless worship, but rather that you would love Him with all of your heart, your soul, your mind, and strength! God is not interested in an outside offering if the inside is not with it!

The danger of not giving your best inwardly is that it soon migrates to show in your outward worship. Israel began by bringing pure offerings with impure motives, but eventually they began to offer defective sacrifices outwardly as well. Now they are bringing God the blind lambs and the lame and the sick and in turn are keeping the best for themselves. God is getting the leftovers and the throw offs. What they had been bringing mentally they are now openly offering physically. They are worshipping God but He is getting second best.

We do not keep cows and raise grain, but people today still do the same thing to God. What about people who pray when it happens to fit in their schedule? What of people who come to church when it works out in their busy life pace that they can fit a service in? What of people who praise God when it is convenient? Are they offering God their first? Are they offering God their best? Is God's kingdom first priority in such people? Is God really pleased when they do offer a bit of sacrifice of their time when everything else has been higher priority and He is just getting the leftovers?

How can you tell if you are offering such a sacrifice to God? Look at the second half of the verse:

God says to Israel, "take your sacrifice that you are offering me and serve it to your governor. Would he accept it?" To apply that to modern day times, if you were to take your spiritual habits of attendance and apply them to your job, would your boss be happy? If you took your spiritual habits of priorities and applied them to work, would they smile and give you a raise? "Oh yeah, boss, well, I've got this on my mind and so if I can squeeze work in my schedule, I'll be there." "Oh, yeah, I know that the tax code says that I've got to pay my taxes, but I've been busy this year and spending time with my family and all and had a lot of colds and such and haven't got around to it." Try that one on your governor and we'll send you flowers in jail! God into work and say "well, I'm not going to move my arms and legs today and really do anything, but you should just be happy I'm here today!" Yeah right! And yet people offer to God what they would never dare to offer to their boss or authority over them!

Let me point out that God never asked for everything but just the first and the best. If a man had a thousand sheep in his local flock, there is no commandment from God for that man to give all thousand of his lambs, but rather God just asked for the first and the best. God wants the first-fruits and the best fruit. The rest is yours to keep and enjoy. Jesus said this:

Seek first God's kingdom and God's way and then all these things like houses and land and family and income and food and time will be added to you. I know people who can't be faithful to the house of God because they are wanting better things for their family and their living. And yet despite them working all the time and missing church constantly, they never seem to get it anyway. Maybe if they would do things God's way and put His kingdom first, then they would find that God would give them the things that they desired and they wouldn't have to work three jobs to get it! Many "Christians" believe that Jesus was lying when He said this verse because they don't trust it. If they get in a money crunch, then overtime takes the place of church. When they get a job, they never consider their commitment to the house of God first, but whatever hours the job gives them is what God has to work around. "Well, I've got to work this Sunday, so I won't be there -- gotta make a living you know." Yes, but truly what is first in that person's life? Is it God or work? Maybe that's why they are always struggling and in debt and broke, because they are putting their work and their money first rather than offering God the best!

In our other text, Jesus sat against the treasury with His disciples and watched people offer their money in the offering box. The scripture says that the rich "cast in much" and then a little widow came and gave "two mites" which in the Greek indicates a value of 1/64th of a denarius which was the average day's wages for a laborer. To put it in modern day equivalents, if an average manual laborer works a ten hour day at $6 an hour then 1/64th of that is less than a buck. She gave the modern day equivalent of less than what you buy a coke for in the corner store. Jesus told His disciples:

Jesus said that she gave "more than all the contributors to the treasury." We miss the meaning of that. Not that she gave more than the rich man before her had given, but if you were to empty the treasury box that day and pile up the day's worth of offerings, in God's eyes, her small change was worth more than all of the other combined. Why? Because -- although God did not require it of her -- she had given all she had, and God judges the offering by the amount of sacrifice to the person giving it and by nothing else!

And more importantly, she was given God her best and first. It was the last cents to her name. It meant that she had nothing to trust in for her next meal and yet she had given it to God. I have known people to not pay their tithes when they "didn't have the money to pay their bills" and such people will again and again "not have money to pay their bills" because they are not giving God the best and the first. As crazy as it sounds, if you want to be blessed of God, then pay your tithes even if it means that you do not have something to eat that day, and then you will have seen for yourself what David said: "I have never seen the righteous forsaken, nor His seed begging bread." Hear this preacher: I have seen some Christians and tithe payers broke and foodless and forsaken, but I have never seen a Christian who always paid their tithes and offering by giving God the first and the best in such a predicament. Bringing God leftovers does not pronounce the blessing of God in your life. Bringing God more the next time just because you have it to spare does not bring the blessing of God in your life. God is not interested in "more" but in the first and the best.

I've known some people to make up for their not giving God first and best by giving "more and more" and it never makes up for it. And let me say this, if you think that God required too much and that living for God is a great sacrifice, then that is probably a good indication that you are giving Him "more" rather than first and best. Three hours of prayer a day is no substitute to beginning your day talking to Him. Extra praise and extra time spent this weekend does not make up for all of last week where your will was priority. I've known people say "I'm too busy to pray and too busy for the things of God everyday." But to that I would say "then you are too busy." And furthermore if you would put the kingdom of God first, then you would be amazed at how much time you had for the other stuff. If you don't have time to pray in a day, then you are never going to get everything done that you need to do, but if you would invest some time in prayer and devotion, you would be surprised that you have enough time for everything. It's not magic, it's a promise from God: seek ye first my kingdom and all these things...!

And let me say this before we move on. If you are stealing from God by giving Him the leftovers, then you are really robbing yourself. Let me say that again. A failure to give God the first and the best is stealing from yourself because that sacrifice is costing you something but you will get little from God in return because He will not accept second best. And so you are out the sacrifice without the blessing and so you have stolen blessing and good from yourself. But if you were to give your best, then God would bless you by giving you His best, and His best will always out value your best and so you gain!

The danger of not giving your best is that you begin a downward spiral of greater and greater sacrifice without the blessing. Which brings us to the next step:

There is a sarcasm and implied meaning in the Hebrew that is missing from the English translations here. The Hebrew word translated in the KJV as "in vain" and here as "uselessly" is chinnam which means "devoid of cost or advantage." The point of the verse is that the priests got the point where they would not open the doors of the temple and receive sacrifice unless they had something to gain from it. In modern terms, they would only offer God a sacrifice when they needed a blessing and they were going to get something out of it.

Do not people progress like this today? What begins with offering of right praise and worship with impure or insincere heart becomes the outward practice of giving God second best physically. And then God becomes the contingency plan, the 911 call, or the welfare system, where they only come to His house when they desperately need something and they have no where else to turn in their own doings. They only offer the sacrifice of prayer if they desperately need divine intervention. They only want a pastor in their life when they have finally realized that their life is falling apart. They only want to give in the offering when they are in danger of losing it all.

And more subtly the spirit transfers until we have Christians that obey and give only based upon what they could be blessed with. The attitude of obeying God's Word only for the blessing is simply greed dressed up in Sunday clothes. Some people only obey the commandments of scripture are clearly attached to reward. If they can see that they will be blessed and they can fully understand ahead of time how it benefits them, then they will obey it. But on the other hand, if they cannot see obvious benefits, they choose not to obey those scriptures. When people say "well I don't know why God would ask that?" they are only giving if they get something back!

When Job said:

We tend to miss the full connotation of what he meant. The Hebrew word for "slay" there is literally "to cut off." We always preach it that Job was saying "if God kills me, then I've still got heaven and so everything will be alright." But that's not quite what Job was saying. He was saying in effect "even if I am cut off from His blessing and never see His throne and never see His presence and never see Him again, then I will still hope in Him!" Job, you see, was not serving God because of what he received in doing so, but rather was serving God because he loved God with all of his heart. That's why despite personal tragedy, and losing everything including his health, Job was able to say "blessed be the name of the Lord" and remain faithful!

Certainly there are great benefits to obeying the Word of God, but what if we all reached the level where we were obeying them because of our great love for Jesus rather than what we get out of it in return? What would happen if we all obeyed God from that vantage point rather than Christian greed? For one thing, no trial or devil-hardship would ever faze us in our walk with God. If we are serving Him because we love Him, then we will never turn away. Job said "you can take my family, you can take my health, you can take my wealth, you can take my friends, but the one thing you can't steal devil, is my love for God!" It becomes a paradox of Christianity similar to 'he who loves his life will lose it and he who loses his life for My sake will find it": only those who will serve God for the love of it will truly make it to the end to reap the blessings! Only those who serve God not because of the blessings will receive them! And the reason that it works that way is because we are never more like God when we serve Him out of love, after all His love was unconditional and the sacrifice of Calvary was such that even though He had no promise of you and I one day serving Him, He unhesitatingly gave everything! Without a promise of blessing, He was faithful, and when you and I get that same type of love, we have tapped into something greater than human ideas or religion, but we have tapped into the highest and most powerful love there is: the pure love of God Almighty!

And so we come to the final end of the progression that just began with Israel not giving God their best. They say "how tiresome serving God is." And they "disdainfully sniff at it." Have you ever known someone who had once been so on fire for God and yet now looks disdainfully at such acts of service and obedience. They are people who have walked this same path that Israel had trodden. They are the end result of people who did not give God their best.

When you begin to give God the outward sacrifice without it truly being from the heart, then eventually you become satisfied to just give God outwardly second best. After a while, you think "what's the point in it at all" and gravitate to only sacrificing to Him and giving to Him when you need something in return. And eventually the attitude swings to "why bother?" "what is the point anyway?" "how tiresome and weary this whole thing is!"

The end result of not giving God your best is weariness:

Eventually worship without the heart involved grows wearisome.

Eventually worship without pure sacrifice involved grows pointless.

Eventually worship without blessing turns to greed offerings.

... And so people begin to say "it is a weary thing to live for God."

But why is it weary? Because you have traveled down a long path of not giving God your best, and so it has become wearisome to you because you are not serving Him with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and so are not getting blessed with all that He has. There is no point to empty worship. There is no point to giving God second best. There is no point in all of that and so you grow weary and you quit. But when people do so they forget that the reason there was no point was because of how they changed in their sacrifice. The old saying is "it's hard to live for God easy, but it's easy to live for God hard."

There is a point to true inward-driven worship.

There is a point to true pure sacrifice.

There is a point to worship without instant blessing.

... And such a lifestyle leads to excitement and zeal for the things of God and people saying "it's a great thing to live for God."

The difference between the two is traced all the way back to the beginning decision of how you will serve Him. One chooses to in every way give God their foremost and utmost and the other chooses not to give God the best. And so the danger of not giving God your best is that it places you on a path that will eventually lead to dissatisfaction and someone who has grown weary with the things of God. And so they allow their weariness to keep them from "enduring to the end."

It's sort of like a rollercoaster. To the coaster freak on the front row enjoying themselves with their hands in the air, the ride is over way too fast. To the fearful halfway back with their hands clamped on the bar, their eyes tightly shut, and their mouth open only in prayer, it seems like a ride of eternal duration. So it is living for God. To those who will give God their best, live seems to fly by too fast because of the excitement and happiness that living for God brings. But to those who choose not to give God their best, to live for Him is a wearisome thing. The ride hasn't changed, but what is different is the rider's attitude and approach!

There is a great danger in not giving God your best in everything because it will lead you to a place where life is wearisome and trouble filled. But there is a great happiness that comes with living for God by giving your first and best to Him because there is no ride of life that can compare with such a way of living! Make up in your mind to always give God the best that you've got no matter what area of offering you find yourself in!