1. Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. The message from God’s Word, as we continue our stewardship emphasis, is taken from Malachi 3:10 and is entitled, “Ten Bags of Gold Relate to the Plate,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Picture this. The sermon is done and here comes the plate—the offering plate! Shall I leave a tip . . . to fulfill my obligation to God for his care? Some of my guilt goes away when I give; I’ll feel less guilty. Or, shall I leave the price of admission? Surely it costs something to put on the Sunday service. I’m a member; I’ll give my dues as a good member. Or, I’ll give “for services rendered.” After all, someday I’ll need those services: Baptism, wedding, funeral.
3. Picture all the blessings God gives you: food, clothing, home, land, money, goods, a devout spouse, devout children, good weather, peace, health, good friends, faithful neighbors, and the like. Picture God giving those blessings to you wrapped in bags of gold. And imagine that with each of these blessings God gives you, he likes to divide the blessing into in a collection of ten golden bags—each blessing divided up into ten portions and wrapped in ten bags of gold. God gives you ten golden bags of groceries. Ten golden bags of clothing. Ten golden bags of money. Ten golden bags of good weather. Ten golden bags of good health, and the like.
4. The question that the prophet Malachi sets before us today is “How do those ten bags of gold relate to the plate?” Those hit-and-miss reasons—leaving a tip, feeling less guilty, the price of admission, dues, for services rendered—they all miss the point. God, in his Word, gives noble reasons as to how your ten bags of golden blessings relate to the church offering plate. God Calls for Returning to Him One Bag of Gold Out of the Ten Bags He Gives You.
5. Through the prophet Malachi, God says, “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. And thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need” (3:10). Let’s recognize that the offerings you put in the plate are not between you and the plate. The tithes, or offerings, Malachi wrote about were given to God in the temple. All offerings brought to the temple and all the offerings you put in the plate are given to God. But, for the sake of this message today, and because the offering plate is passed to you, we’ll speak of how ten bags of gold relate to the plate. So, as you look into the plate, see God there in the plate, receiving your offering.
6. Now in the prophet Malachi’s time, it had been about 80 years since the Israelites returned from captivity in Babylon. The grandchildren and great-grandchildren now were working the soil and eating of the good of the land. But some drastic changes had come with the new generations. They had fallen back into the same sins that had led to the fall of their great nation to the Babylonian army. They were bringing crippled sacrifices to offer to God. Some were saying it was so tiresome to bring an offering to God. Some promised good offerings, but the offerings they brought were flawed. Finally, God declared that, in fact, they were stealing from him in the offerings they were bringing.
7. God gave the Israelites in the Old Testament several laws about the offerings they were to bring to the temple. The law referred to in our text is the law about the tithe. The Israelites had an agricultural society, so the tithe offering was stated in Lev 27:30: “Every tithe of the land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the trees, is the Lord’s; it is holy to the Lord.” The people were to bring an offering of 10 percent of the family’s increase in goods.
8. Another important offering the Israelites brought to the temple was the offering of the firstfruits. Ex 23:19: “The best of the firstfruits of your ground you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God.” As they began to harvest their grain, and as they began picking fruit from the trees, they were to bring the first of those fruits. And they were to bring “the best,” that is, grain with no spoilage and fruit that was juicy and ripe—the best for the Lord.
9. In the prophet Malachi’s day, the people again were having heart trouble, the kind of heart trouble the prophet Ezekiel had described two centuries earlier: hearts of stone when they should have had hearts of flesh (Ezek. 11:19). A heart of stone is a hardened heart that shows no signs of life. A stone-hard heart leads a person to serve self. The prime example in the Bible of a hardened heart is Pharaoh, ruler in Egypt: “He hardened his heart and would not listen to [Moses and Aaron], as the Lord had said” (Ex 8:15). People with hardened hearts do not want to listen to what God’s Word says to them.
10. We look back to the time our ancestors came to this land of plenty, America. They worked the soil and ate of the good of the land. They gathered together in their homes and church buildings to give thanks to God, bringing their thank offerings to God. Are we satisfied, with every gift God gives us? Or do we think we need to hold back the best? We have some of the same heart trouble people had in Malachi’s time: hearts of stone that don’t want to listen to what God says in his Word.
11. God makes it clear that he has something to say about the ten bags of golden blessings he gives us. In Malachi’s time, people were to bring a tithe, 10 percent, as a thank offering to the temple. “Bring the full tithe into the storehouse” (Mal 3:10). We who live after Jesus offered himself for us on the cross and was raised for our salvation no longer have a law from God that we must put 10 percent into the offering plate, nor that we must bring the first of everything we harvest.
12. But, the Old Testament law of bringing the offering of the tithe and the offering of the firstfruits can be a good guide for us Christians. Could we possibly want to do less? Think of how much more richly blessed we are than were those Old Testament believers—and I’m not talking about the air-conditioning, satellite TV, and indoor plumbing they never dreamed of. They lived every day by the promise that the Messiah would come someday, but when they didn’t know. We live knowing Jesus did come, that he did fulfill God’s Law for us where we so badly fail, that on the cross he did suffer the punishment of hell so that we never will, that he has fully accomplished our salvation so that we will live in the joys and riches of heaven with him forever.
13. What’s more, specifically because Jesus’ death on the cross has reconciled us to God, removing the sin that separated us from him, that would have cut us off from every blessing, God has now given us everything we have and everything we truly need: food, clothing, home, land, money, good weather, peace, health, and the like. Today we picture God giving us all those gifts in ten bags of gold. The first action a family does with those ten bags of gold is to give to God first. The family does that first, before making any purchases, before paying any bills. The first portion goes to God as a firstfruit thank offering. The ten bags of gold also can relate to the plate as a tithe, 10 percent of everything God gives. That means out of every group of ten bags of gold God gives, one bag is placed in the plate. In our cash economy, that means we determine, we work out, what the 10 percent is and write that check first. Remember, look for God in the offering plate, because he’s the one with whom you’re relating with a firstfruit offering and with an offering of a tithe, just as the Old Testament people did. The remaining nine bags of gold are for the family to use for savings and for living.
14. The devil and the world around us set in front of us many temptations about the ten bags of gold God gives us. We see how the world uses all the blessings that come from God’s hand. “I worked hard for it; it’s mine. I can do with it whatever I want.” We are tempted to think the same way. Some people use all ten bags of golden blessings only for themselves. They serve themselves, without a thought of God, who gives his blessings to all people alike, whether they be good or evil, just or unjust (Mt 5:45). The temptations to serve ourselves with the blessings God gives us work on us when our hearts are hearts of stone. Hardened hearts tend not to listen to God’s Word.
15. So, God does his surgery on hearts of stone. God promised: “I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh” (Ezek 11:19). God preps us for surgery by washing us clean in the water of Holy Baptism. That is water combined with God’s Word. Thus, it has the power to work forgiveness of sin and to rescue us from the devil and his temptations. Jesus gave his all for us on the cross. Now in our Baptism, those blessings of forgiveness, deliverance, and eternal life are ours, and that very Baptism gives us new hearts to believe that.
16. The new heart of flesh God gives, replacing our heart of stone, is fashioned after the heart of Jesus, a heart that does the will of the Father in heaven. After God’s heart surgery on us, we work at making the ten bags of golden blessings relate to the plate. Our offerings flow as thank offerings, out of our renewed heart. Following God’s surgery comes the recovery—a lifelong recovery. And the prescription for a strong recovery is a regular dose of hearing, reading, and studying God’s Word and regular attendance at the Lord’s Supper, for where there is forgiveness of sins, there is also life and salvation.
17. God used the rule of law in Old Testament times for the offerings brought to the temple. For us people with a new heart, our offerings turn into a rule of gratitude. God sets the stage in Deut 8:18: “You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth.” That changes our relation to the plate: “Remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth.” The new heart God puts in us leads us to make this commitment, 2 Cor 8:5: “They gave themselves first to the Lord.” That is how you relate to the plate. “They gave themselves first to the Lord.” Then 2 Cor 9:12 describes the bag of gold you put in the plate: “overflowing in many thanksgivings to God.” The new heart God puts in you beats in time with these words from God in 1 Cor 16:2: “On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper.” Close up all your thoughts with the words of 2 Cor 9:7: “God loves a cheerful giver.”
18. In our Malachi text, God makes a promise: he will “open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need.” This is only a picture, because there are no windows in the sky. But God says he will pour blessings on his people from above. The plate will keep coming to you. “Here I sit, and here comes the plate. God’s blessings keep on coming to me. Those ten bags of gold all relate to the plate. I return to God some of what he gives me.” See God in the plate. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.
