Those seventy years in Babylonian captivity had ended, and the Jews were returning to the land God promised to give to them in the days of Abraham. There were only three final books of the Old Testament to be revealed. What had God not told them which He needed to tell them? What truth had He not yet revealed? After these three prophets—Haggai, Zephaniah and Malachi—penned their messages, God quit sending anymore messengers. For the next 400+ years, the Jews would be without prophets living among them. God had finished that part of His work among them and had given them all they needed in the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament.
There is so much to be learned by studying these final three books. He had only these three men to give them all that was missing from His message to His chosen people. What did He have to say?
Look at the book of Malachi. This short book of four chapters concludes His message to His chosen people until He sent New Testament prophets to them. The first half of the book begins by reminding them that He had loved them more than any people on the earth, but they had failed to respond to that love. They were worshiping God but bringing sacrifices to Him that were far from those which He demanded. They were bringing sick animals, crippled animals, which were unfit for human consumption to offer to Him. Their priests had failed to lead them in the ways of God, and He told them that He would rub the animal dung from those animals in their faces. They were literally robbing God of what was His by such sacrifices and their refusal to tithe.
In the last half of the book, God delivers His final message showing that, after the close of the Old Testament, “Someone Will Come.” Before that Someone came, He would send His messenger to prepare the way for Him when He came. “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, even the Messenger of the covenant” (Mal. 3:1).
That messenger was John the Baptist. Malachi described the work of John. He would “…turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers…” (Mal. 4:6). These exact words were quoted by the angel, Gabriel, when he told John’s father that his son was to be the messenger, the forerunner of Jesus.
We will look more at these final books next week, but let me urge you to pay special attention to God’s final command to Israel. It was the last command He would give before the four hundred years of silence. “Remember the law of Moses, My servant.” It is vital that we know and do His will!