Malachi, or “the messenger,” is the name given to the last book in the Old Testament.  God’s people had suffered through generations of captivity and bondage and had been given promises of a better day just around the corner. But, that day hadn’t come just yet.  While they hoped for blessings they found poverty, famine, drought, sickness and moral decay, instead; skepticism, pride and rebellion were gaining ground and–in feeling forgotten by the Lord–they themselves were the ones who had forgotten God.

So Malachi wrote.  He wrote to encourage the discouraged.  He wrote to rekindle the flames of God’s favor that they had extinguished by their disobedience.  He wrote to strongly call them back to remembrance of the Lord’s work in their history and of their responsibility to follow Him with unhindered hearts and whole offerings.  Only in remembering his faithfulness and obeying His rule would they experience his favor.

Malachi 3:16 reads:

Then those who feared the LORD talked with each other, and the LORD listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the LORD and honored his name.

The Malachi Message is a place where people who fear the Lord can talk together while He listens in!  And maybe our stories of seeing Him illuminated in rush-hour traffic, in chance encounters with strangers on subways, in grocery store check-out lines and hospital waiting rooms will become our own scrolls of remembrance that honor His name and encourage us to never forget the infinite demonstrations of His great faithfulness.

Melissa Falk leads a growing intercultural church in Connecticut, 30 miles from New York City, and shares her home with a big, white and lovable mutt named Gracie. Her passion is encouraging spiritual formation in others and sharing random stories of experiencing God  and encountering faith building moments in unexpected places.