Welcome to a year in the Bible with daily grace. The Bible tells one big story of

redemption and we want to spend five minutes every day journeying through the Bible from start to finish, and exploring how all of it

points to Jesus. Hey everybody welcome back to the Bible in a year of daily grace. My name is

Miranda and I'm your host for the short book of Malachai. We are wrapping up the book today and then you will

be done with the Old Testament. Wow! You should celebrate today with some ice cream.

Maybe some ice cream and cake if you were feeling it.

I know I would be, but before your celebration, let's take some time and look at these

last couple chapters from the Old Testament Prophet. They are worth it. Part of what had become so

wearisome and tiring to the Lord in his people's behavior was that they chose to

doubt him again and again.

They looked at the world around them and thought that since evil people seemed to have no consequences for their actions,

that the Lord was not just.

Just look at his own people, they must have thought.

They were still under the control of their enemies.

Things had not completely returned back to normal.

And where was this Messiah that he promised them? But behind the

scenes God was orchestrating his plan of salvation. He was preparing a messenger who would come and clear the way before him.

Clear the way before him. What in the world does that mean? Notice in the first verse

of chapter 3 that the capitalization of messenger changes indicating two messengers.

The first messenger, the one who would clear the way, is a foreshadowing of John the Baptist, the cousin of Jesus.

John the Baptist was widely recognizable before Christ. His ministry got the attention of God's people and he was baptizing

them for repentance left and right. But he was not the final messenger. The final messenger, the messenger of the covenant, was God himself. Jesus, God in flesh,

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