GOD WANTS YOU TO BE CLEAN FOR CHRISTMAS
December 6,
2009
Malachi 3:1-4
“See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me. Then suddenly the Lord you are
seeking will come to his temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says
the LORD Almighty. 2 But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For
he will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap. 3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; he
will purify the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then the LORD will have men who will bring
offerings in righteousness, 4 and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the LORD,
as in days gone by, as in former years.
MEDITATION POINTS ON THE SERMON:
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God is concerned about ______________________ not of the skin but of the _____________.
“Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.” (John 13:8)
Jesus purifies us with His _____________________.
“The blood of Jesus His son purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:7)
The Lord demonstrates His unchanging _________________ to His people’s purity.
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I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your
impurities…” (Ezekiel 36:24-29)
Even the _____________impurity of sin will kill us.
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in
this way death came to all men, because all sinned— “ (Romans 5:12)
God always sends us messengers to confront us that we might be ________________.
Cleanliness is the _______________ of Godliness.
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If you were going to design a Christmas card what would you put on the front cover? Would you draw
a picture of the Christ-child lying in a manager as Mary and Joseph stand guard and a wide-eyed
shepherd boy peers in on the little babe? Maybe you would sketch an angel next to the words “Peace
on earth and good will to all”? Or perhaps you would illustrate Jesus with his sleeves rolled up
carrying a box of bleach. What?!? You see, if you would have asked the prophet Malachi to design a
card commemorating the coming of Christ that’s how he would have depicted the Messiah. God told
Malachi that the Messiah would come as one who cleans with a launderer’s soap. God is committed
to cleanliness.
We are too aren’t we? I don’t like to look into the glass of milk I’m drinking and see anything dark
floating around. We are concerned about clean water, clean air and a clean environment. And what
about personal cleanliness?
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GOD WANTS YOU TO BE CLEAN FOR CHRISTMAS
December 6,
2009
At Glens and other general stores, there are shelves upon shelves of bathing products that
we need for our American rituals of purification. First, you and I bath or shower every day, every
morning and every night...with some form of scented soap. Yes, scented soap. You, of course, as a
consumer, have many choices; there is shelf after shelf of scented soap for your choosing. You can
smell like Oatmeal or Almond or...Aloe Vera or...English Lavender or...Peach Blossom or Irish Spring.
Then, of course, we have hundreds of options for shampoo – again with countless fragrances and
types. Then you have deodorants which can your underarms can smell like...cool spice...or musk...
lemon, and just regular. Finally we could spend hours talking about the colognes or perfumes. Its
true: every single one of us go through these American rituals of purification, daily, and we all believe
that cleanliness is next to godliness.
God too, is concerned about cleanliness. The book of Leviticus reads like a sanitary manual. There are
instructions about personal cleansing after childbirth. There several chapters that read like a
dermatology textbook, giving detailed instructions about diagnosing and treating skin diseases. In the
last few years we’ve heard about the problem with getting rid of mold in houses–that’s nothing new,
God devoted over a hundred verses in Leviticus about getting rid of mold and mildew!
Proctor and Gamble asked independent chemists to analyze the ingredients of Ivory Soap. The result
was only .56 % of impurities were discovered. So, Harley Proctor proudly proclaimed Ivory Soap was
99.44% pure–he even had the phrase copyrighted. But truthfully, 99.44 pure isn’t pure at all–it’s
impure. The meaning of the word pure means “unmixed.” And 99.44% means mixed. It’s almost pure.
How clean are you today? I’m not talking about your skin. How clean is your heart today? You may
say, “Pretty clean, pastor. I’m better than a lot of people.” Let me ask it a different way: Is your heart
pure today? Is it totally pure? Do you think God would be pleased if your heart was 80% clean? or
90% pure? Do you think God is pleased if your heart is 99.44% pure? We realize that we can’t make
ourselves that pure. But God can. That’s why God issued the great invitation found in Isaiah 1:18:
“Come now, let us reason together,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be
as white as snow; thought they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” Jesus said, “Unless I
wash you, you have no part with me.”1 The Bible is very concerned about inner cleanliness.
Malachi compares the coming Savior to “launders soap.” That is an wimpy translation. In the original
Hebrew it is called “fuller’s soap” which was used to wash the filthy hands of blacksmiths. Not merely
soap but alkaline; Super strong stuff, like Lava with pumice or Borax or Fels-Naptha. It is the kind of
soap which really digs in and gets the grease and dirt out; none of this Yardley’s soft soap stuff.
That’s what Jesus is all about. Jesus reminds us that we have this sin, which is deep within our hearts,
ground deep down into the pores of our life. Jesus is like abrasive soap to get at the sin that is
deep...so very deep within us.
The second image or word picture that is used by Malachi to describe Jesus is that he is like a
“refiner’s fire.” His words and message are to be scorching hot, to burn off the impurities in our
lives. When I think of a refiner’s fire, I think of working at Caspar Metals in Thiensville during my
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(John 13:8)
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GOD WANTS YOU TO BE CLEAN FOR CHRISTMAS
December 6,
2009
seminary years. When it was time to refine the silver we had been reclaiming, we heated up a blast
furnace about eight feet in diameter, filled with molten silver, boiling red hot silver, burning off all the
impurities. It was a rather intimidating to feel the over 900 degree heat radiating from the sides of
the furnace. It was even more intimidating to look into a furnace of hot boiling lava of molten
silver. You knew that there was awesome and frightening power in that burning and boiling molten
lava. So it is with God’s word. His word was to be like a refiner’s fire; his word from God was to
burn off the impurities in people’s lives; to burn off the impurities ... deeply imbedded ... in our lives.
God doesn’t want us to be caught with our hands dirty. Jesus didn’t use soap but his own blood
which he shed on the cross. “The blood of Jesus His son purifies us from all sin.”2 Jesus’ blood
cleanses us from our sins because it is pure blood – blood that doesn’t contain any of its own sin and
therefore absorbs all of our sinfulness like a big sponge. Therefore we can be confident that because
of Jesus our sins are covered and hidden from God and we can trust that he won’t punish us for
them.
The Lord is demonstrating His unchanging commitment to His people’s purity. God says through
Ezekiel, 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your
impurities and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will
remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you
and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws….29 I will save you from all your
uncleanness.” 3 He loves us too much to leave us to our pollution. He loves us too much to allow the
carcinogens of this world to destroy us. So in mercy, He makes a personal visit to purify us---even
though we don’t realize how dirty we really are by nature.
Whenever there is an outbreak of sickness, one of the most important things you can do to stay
healthy is to wash your hands frequently. You can pick up bacteria and viruses off almost anything---a
doorknob, a telephone, a pen, a book. That microscopic impurity can make you sick, and if you get a
bad enough case, even kill you.
Sin, no matter what the “size”, no matter how “insignificant” it may seem, is a virus that is 100% fatal.
God reminds us, “12 Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through
sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned— “4 You’ve seen the symptoms in
your life. Sometimes you can feel that sense of emptiness – the world so pointless – that is symptom
of sin. You see all those the mistakes you keep making in your life – more symptoms of sin. All those
moments of complete, utter selfishness, those moments when you give in to temptation. And then
you feel that guilt.
You’ve tried to change. You’ve tried to fix yourself. But sin is incurable, and deep down, you know
that’s true. Sin won’t leave you along, and you feel that sense of helplessness and hopelessness. At
times, you feel despair and desperation. What am I to do with my sin?
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1 John 1:7
Ezekiel 36:24-29
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Romans 5:12
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GOD WANTS YOU TO BE CLEAN FOR CHRISTMAS
December 6,
2009
Let Christ cleanse your soul through the waters of baptism. Jesus also cleanses you at the Lord’s
Supper. There Christ speaks to you, and tells you that this is his body, given for you. This is his blood,
shed for you. You have contact with the very body and blood of Christ, sacrificed on the cross to take
away your sin. And when you have contact with these things, your soul is cleansed. Let him cleanse
you through his Word as it burns away the impurities of our thinking. Your sins are forgiven. May this
be something that brings you joy.
Importantly, you and I begin to see that there was no Christmas without the deep cleansing from our
sin. It is only as we are freed from that sin which is deep within that we experience the joy of
Christmas morning. God wants you and me to be clean for Christmas…not December 25th, but for the
final Christmas, when Jesus returns to take us home.
You see, it is true. Cleanliness is next to godliness. Or, you can say, cleanliness is the beginning of
Godliness. Amen.
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