“I have always loved you,” says the Lord” (Malachi 1:2, NLT).
Malachi wrote to the Jewish exiles that had resettled in Judah probably sometime during the reign of King Darius of Persia (521-486 BC). Malachi begins his oracle by conveying the simple truth that God has always loved Israel.
“He takes away the first to establish the second” (Hebrews 10:9, HCSB).
The Hebrews writer explains how the sacrifice of Christ on the cross replaced the Old Testament system of blood sacrifices and burnt offerings.
The Hebrews writer says that the Old Testament law was a representation of God’s reality, not the reality itself: “The law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the actual form of these realities” (vs. 1).
“I will give them, in My house and within My walls, a memorial and a name better than sons and daughters. I will give each of them an everlasting name that will never be cut off. And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord minister to Him, love the name of ‘Yahweh’ and become His servants” (Isaiah 56:5-6, HCSB).
The Shakespearian character, Juliet asked Romeo: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Juliet’s question means that what really matters is not what someone is called but what someone is.
