After the Babylonian captivity, God’s people were often more concerned about their own affairs than God’s. So God sent Haggai and Zechariah to urge his people to rebuild the temple. Malachi threatened God’s judgment upon the people for their neglect of the Lord and his Word, but the prophet ended with the wonderful promise of the coming Messiah.
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“Verses 8 and 9 speak of refining from the throngs on Palm Sunday to the handful of people on Maundy Thursday to the forlorn little groups on Easter Sunday. It was a time of refining ‘in the whole land,’ as verse 8 described it. The church was different. The disciples, who before Jesus’ death feared persecution, welcomed suffering for their faith. When they were beaten, they rejoiced ‘because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name’ (Acts 5:41). This was gold that had been purified. They knew the Name. They called on it as Zechariah had foretold. They gladly suffered for it.” (Pages 116–117)
“This peace will come upon those people on the King’s side. Real peace comes in knowing that you have won and that the other side is forever incapable of fighting.” (Page 94)
“‘The more you work for yourself, the less you will have. The more you work for God, the more you will have.’” (Page 12)
“Worry and anxiety come because we forget the fact that God is with us.” (Page 49)
“He loves us so much he can’t stand the thought of losing us to some false lover. His love is so great that he even comes looking for us when we have been unfaithful to him. His sense of jealousy is sharper and fiercer than ours; his forgiveness spans greater canyons of transgression than ours. He even forgives us when we cannot forgive ourselves. ‘This then is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence whenever our hearts condemn us. For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything’ (1 John 3:19, 20).” (Page 79)