“And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness” (Malachi 3:3).
TEXT — Malachi 3:1-6
Message
No dross is ever retained in gold after an encounter with the smith’s furnace. The outcome is a precious metal fit for use in the royal court. It is the same with sullied clothes sent to the launderer. He turns them over and over in the machine until no speck of dirt can be found on them again. Both pass through these gruelling tests to qualify for distinctive presence in the service of their owners.
Like the work of the refiner and the laundry man, the Lord says He is sending His dear Son, Jesus Christ to purge and purify His people. The reference to cleansing the Levites points to the purifying of all believers in Christ. We need to be made fully clean for service in His kingdom. The Lord’s desire is that His people become more effective and fruitful in His service.
Therefore, He regularly and constantly prunes and purges them of all things that are capable of dulling their lives and making them ineffective and unfruitful. The purifying process is usually not easy and pleasant to the flesh. It may involve a form of correction and discipline in order to set us right. At other times, it may mean taking away from us certain not-all-together sinful things that tend to act as dross and lures that weaken us. Whatever it is, we should gladly and willingly submit to it. At the end of the day, we will come out as better purified vessels fit for divine use.
Except we are willing to submit ourselves to divine refining, we will never come to be our best. In fact, those dust and dirt that we allow to accumulate in us will eventually become risky to our spiritual health and can damn us. Just as we undertake bathing daily in order to stay clean and healthy, so must we daily present ourselves to the Lord to refine and purge us.
Thought for the day
None dies in God’s refining fire; everyone comes out of it purer.
Listed among “500 most powerful people on the planet” by the Foreign Policy magazine in 2013, Pastor (Dr.) William F. Kumuyi is the founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry (DCLM) headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria. DCLM started in 1973 as a 15-member Bible study group right in Kumuyi’s apartment at University of Lagos where he was a lecturer. His revolutionary Bible teaching on personal holiness and commitment to evangelism soon gained so much traction and resulted in a widespread revival.
Adeyanju Oluwaseun