Would that God would lay open your hearts this morning as you now lay your hands upon his word.

And open to the last book of the Old Testament, the book of Malachai, and the third chapter, beginning of the 13th verse.

Your words have been stout against me, says the Lord.

Yet you say, how have we spoken against thee? You have said, it is vain to serve God. What is the good of our keeping

his charge or of walking as in mourning before the Lord of hosts. Henceforth we deem the arrogant blessed.

Evildoers not only prosper, but when they put God to the test, they escape.

Then those who feared the Lord spoke with one another.

The Lord heeded and heard them.

And the Book of Remembrance was written before him of those who feared the Lord and thought on

his name.

They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, my special possession on the day when I act, and I will spare them as a man

spares his son who serves him.

Then once more you shall distinguish between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves

God and one who does not serve him.

Today's text is intended for two groups of people.

The first group are people who doubt the justice of God

or who have already made up their minds that he's not just

and resent that he doesn't meet their claims upon him.

And to that group of people, the text is intended to be a warning to come back from that kind of distrust and dishonoring

stance towards God, reconsider the matter more deeply, and grant to God the freedom to vindicate his cause and the

claims of justice when and how he will. The other group of people to whom this text is addressed this morning

is the people who already trust God's justice, people for whom in our day have been persuaded by his son Jesus Christ that he will

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