In Malachi 4 God prophetically declared the condition on the earth in our time - breakdown in family relationships, destruction and broken-hearts. The problem lies in our heart. We don't have to live out of disappointment and pain. God wants to heal the broken-hearted and TURN our hearts. We can resolve issues of the heart. King David and his wife Michal both suffered injustice from King Saul, but their heart response determined their destiny. Discover powerful keys for accessing God's promises and blessing. It's not automatic, it requires a response.
Open your Bible with me to Malachi 4. We’ve just been having a wonderful few days of meetings; God moving and touching so many lives. I was weighing up and praying on what to do today and I want to share with you a message called ‘Honour your father and your mother’.
We’re going to start here in Malachi – which is the very last closing of the Old Testament. There’s about 400 years of silence before God begins to move and Jesus enters this world. So God makes a promise to them – verse 5 and 6: “I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers lest they come and strike the earth with a curse.
So God expresses His concern and prophetically, He reveals a condition that will be in the earth in the last days. Prophetically, He reveals – in the last days before Jesus returns, that one of the chief problems in the earth will be the break-down of family relationships. Families are foundational to our society. Society’s built on strong families; strong marriages; strong relationships and God’s intention is that families should be healthy. God’s intention is that our parents will reveal something of the heart of God to the world.
So he describes here, a break-down in families. It doesn’t matter where you go in the world, this is what you find – immense problems in families. Breaches in relationship between husband and wife, and breakdown between parents and children. What should be a place where there’s great joy and love and it’s a wonderful place to be, in many cases, there’s many issues and problems and pain and destruction. This affects the children when they grow, so problems just multiply generationally.
Notice where God reveals the heart of the problem is – the root of the problem is in the heart. The heart determines what happens in your life. We think we run our life from our mind, and many people try to. But the Bible says – out of the heart flow the issues or rivers of your life.
It tells us in Proverbs 4:23 – “Guard your heart or out of it flows the boundaries of your life.” So when it’s talking about the heart, it’s talking about the connection point between your soul and your spirit. It’s not talking about your mind. It’s talking about the belief systems in the inner man. God says that there will be a need to turn the heart. In other words, the heart is directed in the wrong direction and needs to be converted and turned around.
If we don’t turn the hearts, there’s no flow of love and there’s no flow of healing. It becomes awkward and difficult and people try to behave right but there’s no life flow. God is always concerned not about your performance or external appearance, but your heart. So things can look good on the outside, but be wrong in the heart.
Notice what he says that he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and then children to their fathers. So it’s a twofold turning – towards the children and then from the children towards their parents. He said – if this doesn’t happen, the consequence is destruction, cursing in the face of the earth.
When families are broken down, marriage is divorce, children are abused, the hearts and lives are twisted with bitterness and anger, this is not blessing, this is a curse. Wherever there’s a curse, demonic spirits are operating. So, God wants to bring us into blessing and it always begins with the heart. If God can change your heart, He can change what you believe, then your life will change. Out of your heart flow the issues of your life, or literally the boundaries, the borders, and limitations.