“Behold, I send my messenger, and he will prepare the way before me. And the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold and silver, and they will bring offerings in righteousness to the Lord.” Malachi 3:1-3
Through the prophet Malachi God sends Israel the last words He will say to them for 400 years. The Lord reassures His people that He is not through with them. Despite His silence God still has plans for
His people and will fulfill His promises to them. In chapter 3 God tells Israel of the coming of John the Baptist (God’s messenger) in preparation of the the Messiah’s appearing. When the Messiah comes He will purify the nation.
While Israel learned from its captivity to Assyria and Babylon and never practiced the worship of heathen idols again, their hearts did not turn back to God. Instead of worshipping God according to the “spirit” of his commands and laws They made legalistic rules and added many laws of their own to form a legalistic web of rules that caused people to try to earn God’s favor rather than love Him with all their heart.
As a result God tells the people the Messiah will come to them like a refiner and purifier of silver. But what does that mean? When one watches a refiner of silver he sees a certain process. The
refiner of silver will take silver ore that has many impurities in it. He places the silver on a ladle and puts it into a fire. Silver melts at a temperature of 1,764 °F so the ore is placed in the hottest part of the fire. As the ore melts impurities are drained off. This process is
repeated again and again until the silver is refined to maximum purity. A silver refiner was once asked how the refiner would know the silver reached maximum purity. “It is easy”, he said. “The silver is pure when the refiner can see the reflection of his face in it.”
What can we learn? When we read this we think of the Lord coming to Israel and testing their legalistic beliefs. He placed them under the refiners fire to drive out the impurities so that true faith would
remain. This gives us great insight into the trials and tribulations God allows into our lives. He always has a purpose which is to refine us unto the mage of His Son. Peter knew this truth and shared it with us. “In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.” Politicians say never
to waste a crisis, always us it to gain advantage. As believers we should never waste a test or trial that comes into our lives. They are God-given opportunities for us to allow others to see the refiner’s face in us. As Peter wrote, this “result sin praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed“. Did you catch that last phrase?
A test may not be joyous in this life but it will bring praise to the Lord at the Bema Seat!
Remember that when you are in the hottest part of the fire.