Matt Chandler - The Refining Love of God

If you have your Bibles, grab those. If you don’t have a Bible, there should be a hardback black one somewhere around you. We’re going to be in the Book of Malachi, so I want to give you some time to find that quickly. If you have a church background, this is not a sermon on tithing, so you can just breathe out; like Malachi 3, wait, is he going to pass the plate? Just breathe out—it’s not a sermon on tithing—but go ahead and turn to Malachi 3. If you’re not a Christian and are a guest with us, there’s a hardback Bible somewhere around you. If you don’t really know how to navigate it, there’s a page number on there, and then the big number is the chapter, while the little number is the verse. We’d love for you to read along with us; we’re going to do that here momentarily as we get started.

And this is—I don’t know that I’ve ever done this before—but Darren, happy birthday, brother! Darren turns 16 today and wanted a wetsuit for his birthday. I’m praying that for you, brother, believing by faith that you’re going to be in that wetsuit and that your parents will send me a picture of it. Love you, brother; you are my favorite member of The Village Church, bar none. Please don’t email me and say it’s my kid’s birthday; will you? So, it’s probably not going to happen again.

Now, there is a show on the Discovery Channel called Gold Rush. I don’t know if you’ve seen this; it’s like seven seasons in. Has anyone watched this show? Okay, wow, that’s surprising! I was unaware that so many people actually watched the show; I guess I should have since it’s been seven seasons. I’m drawn to the show for a couple of reasons. The first is that the men and women there are really kind of roughneck blue-collar people, right? They look dirty when they’re clean; are you tracking with that? There’s something about that that reminds me of my dad, and I love my dad—don’t hear me dogging him out. My dad is a man’s man; when you shake his hand, you know that brother has worked for a living. He’s got rough, gnarled hands. He was a military man and then retired early to long-haul truck drive. He’s just a roughneck kind of brother. In fact, we just celebrated his 70th birthday, and he is as roughneck as he has ever been. He’s like one of those dudes you wonder if he will ever die—like will life ever be able to finally kill him?

Now, I don’t want emails; I know he’s going to die, but I’m just saying there’s something about those men that remind me of my father, and so I like it. The other reason I like it—and this will sound really random to you—is when they find gold, it’s just not all that impressive, right? They do like a music thing, and then there’s just a dirty rock. Everybody’s freaking out, «We made it! We’re rich!» But it’s just a dirty rock. If I’m honest, I could get my shovel and go find something like that in my backyard. I could just dig deep enough and pull something out of the ground and say, «We’ve done it!»

What’s happening in the show Gold Rush is that they see some things that are there but will need to be kind of drawn out. They will need to be refined; they will need to be cleaned up. They see the beauty of what’s there, while I just see a dirty rock, right? They see the real value of the gold that’s embedded in the rest of those impurities. Now, the reason I’m using that as an illustration is that at least 12 times in the Bible, God is referred to as the refining fire, right? Our God and his relationship with us is one of refinement. As we think about the coming of Jesus Christ and the initiating love of God towards us, who are sinners, God reaches in to save us. What we see in this initiating love is a God who is not just interested in saving but in transforming us—pulling out of us those beauties that oftentimes we have a hard time seeing, even in ourselves.

The Bible is clear that God sees us as incredibly valuable, which is why I plead with you so often to not treat yourself cheaply, because God does not see you as cheap. The very blood of his Son is shed. God puts on flesh and dwells among us. The Christmas season, Emmanuel, Advent, is about God initiating not only your ransom and rescue but purifying our lives and making us more like Christ for our joy and for his glory. God is ruthlessly concerned about your joy. So, we see in the Book of Malachi God pleading with his people for more, forecasting the coming of Jesus and explaining what happens when he comes. So, let’s look at Malachi 3, starting in verse one. Will you stand with me as we honor the very words of God spoken over us as a community of faith? Malachi chapter 3, starting in verse one: «Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare…»