Steps….

 Steps….

Seeing those steps at the prison the other day brought back memories of visiting Ellis Island nine years ago…

We rode across the river in a boat, entered the buildings used for immigration into the United States…people would process there before entering the States…they were checked for illnesses, paperwork, whatever then sent through a door leading to two sets of steps…one leading to a new life in the USA …another leading, if they were found ill,

 to quarters where they would receive medical treatment, until they could continue healthy…

I stood at the bottom of those worn stairs, thinking of the thousands who had walked them, thrilled to start a new life or discouraged in illness…my ancestors had probably walked them, leaving for the farms in the Midwest, escaping the lives they left behind…there were piles of old trunks displayed some exactly like one I have that made those journeys…

Decisions made that effected generations…just like those steps at the penitentiary, worn by men and women who made decisions to commit crimes against others…

Reading through the book of Malachi, there are calls to decisions as well, steps to renewed obedience of the Israelites …they had chosen wrong paths in several areas of life and He was confronting them to bring them back…

He lists wrongs done and entreats all the change their ways…

-polluted offerings

-faithlessness 

-oppression 

-robbing God in tithes and offerings

Just thinking of those worn steps…how God desires that those worn steps lead over and over to Him…not to paths away from Him..that we find our paths continually with Him…in Him… 

Are my steps leading me to wrong offerings…faithlessness…robbing God  of my tithes and offerings…oppression…correct words…..lack of graciousness?

Malachi writes near the end of the book..

Then those who feared the Lord  spoke with one another. 

The Lord paid attention and heard them, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who feared the Lord and esteemed his name. 

“They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up my treasured possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his son who serves him. Then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him. 

“For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. 

But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. 

You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.

Malachi 3:16-4:3

God proclaims…

…….For I am a great King, says the Lord of hosts, and my name will be feared among the nations. “

For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.

Malachi 1:14b,3:6 

What an end to the Old Testament….a challenge to which steps we take…thank YOU….