Psalms 8:1, 5:1-3, 16:2, and later, 139:23-24
When my Shepherd met me in His green pastures, He found me harried, hurried, and harangued this morning. I have mornings like that, this was one.
After dutifully, but sincerely, presenting my morning prayers and spiritual sacrifices, I found myself thinking about the messages I have heard this week. This morning, trusting the Lord will search me, and know my heart, try me, and know my thoughts, and, finding any wicked way in me, lead me out of that way and into the way everlasting (Psalm 139:23-24), I asked what from the prayer closet He would like me to bring to this post.
God used pastor Carter to stir my thoughts in Malachi: The Priest’s Polluted Bread on His altar. Malachi 1:7-8:
Malachi 1:7 Ye offer polluted bread upon mine altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table of the LORD is contemptible.
Malachi 1:8 And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the LORD of hosts.
If the Lord presses my heart to publish a second edition of The New Cart Church, I’ll title the chapter that deals with the issue of Bible versions: Polluted Bread Upon His Altar.
Along the still waters, I reflected on these things. We are kings and priests unto God (Revelation 1:5-6). We are charged to present “spiritual sacrifices” (1 Peter 2:5).
Nothing could be more repugnant to a sanctified mind than the thought, much less the deed, of carelessly presenting to GOD anything polluted. The insult increases with every glimpse of the Cross: every thing we do for our Lord must be reckoned unworthy when measured by His sacrifice for us: the Lamb of GOD unblemished, unspotted by this world. Everything we do for GOD must be set beside what He has done for us.
But to carelessly, with disregard for His sacrifice, disdain for His glory, and despising the beauty of His holiness, for us to cull from our days’ activities what is by us held in low esteem, worthless, of no value to us, and offer it to our KING is abominable disrespect. It’s unconscionable, outrageous, at the very least bordering on blasphemy, nay, arrogantly crossing that border into infamy.
Jesus is “the Word” (John 1:1), which is the “Bread of heaven.” We who are allowed to share the most precious title of our KING and LORD, pastor (Shepherd), are called to “Feed the flock of God” (1 Peter 5:2). In this service, shall we present “polluted bread” to the flock and vainly imagine GOD takes pleasure in such service?
God Who promised His words came to us by “holy men of God” carried along by the Spirit to provide unpolluted bread for us, also promised His “bread” would be preserved (2 Peter 2:21; Psalm 12:7). Jesus said, “thy word is truth” (John 17:17), and provided the Holy Spirit to guide us to truth (John 16:13). Following the heavenly Guide, and trying the spirits (1 John 4:1), the sheep, who hear His voice and follow Him, will come to the Authorized Version of the Holy Scriptures.
In the valley, the Spirit bade me follow Him. The flesh into which the Word was manifest, is formed of the seed of the woman, it is human. Christ’s body, is likened to bread.
The words Jesus spoke to us are spirit and life (John 6:63), an extension of Himself into our lives: He is “the Word” (John 1:1), “made flesh” (John 1:14), Who likened His flesh to bread (John 6:48), which “Bread” (spiritual) is represented by the bread (physical) that we use in the ordinance of the “Lord’s Table” to which we must never invite the Devil (1 Corinthians 10:21). He presented this “Bread” as a sacrifice for our sins, holy, without blemish, without spot, without sin—where it was polluted with ours but not His sins, that we might be washed, to present our body (spiritual bread?) as a living sacrifice to Him. He called us to lay our bread upon His altar (His Cross—Galatians 2:20; Matthew 16:24).
“We have an altar” (Hebrews 13:10) that is reserved to the New Testament Saint, and we present our offerings there. Our body is one of the sacrifices we are called to present. It must be presented holy, sanctified to the Master’s use, acceptable unto God (Romans 12:1-2; see 2 Timothy 2:21). He does not receive polluted “bread” at His altar.
This is connected to what Jesus is telling us He wants us to do when He says, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9:23).
At the table, Jesus’Cristos anointed my head with His oil and filled my cup by His grace. Goodness and mercy were called to follow as we went into the harvest.
Praying for revival! 🙏
Going live asap:
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