Malachi 2:7

For the priest’s lips should keep knowledge.

The priest’s lips should keep knowledge

There exists a broad and general analogy between the priesthood of the Levitical, and the ministry of the evangelical dispensations, an analogy sufficiently distinct and well-defined to enable us to argue from the one to the other in several most important particulars.

I. The nature of the knowledge which is required. When we speak of human knowledge we are perplexed by its variety and expansiveness. Where are we to find the precise boundaries of the knowledge which the priest’s lips should keep? To a vigorous mind, all nature, and all history, and all philosophy, and every region of thought and imagination will be one vast storehouse of materials for the service of the Lord’s temple. But some precise knowledge is here indicated, as specifically belonging to the priest; a professional knowledge, essential to the due discharge of his office. Surely it must be a knowledge of God’s truth, revealed in holy scripture: the knowledge of Christian doctrine in all its parts and proportions, as propounded by God to the faith of men for their salvation. This is the nucleus around which all his knowledge is to cluster, the centre to which all his other attainments are to converge. This knowledge has a twofold character. It is intellectual, and it is experimental: it is attained by the ordinary operations of the mind, and by the experience of the heart. The Christian minister must be one who rightly divideth the word of truth; one who has the nice and accurate skill to adjust the several portions of God’s truth in their right places and due connections; to build symmetrically as a wise master-builder, and not merely to say what is true, but what is true in its own place and proportion. And this is not a skill which is attained by every one. The priest’s knowledge must be experimental; i.e. learned by a feeling sense of the religious wants and cravings of the human heart. A further and higher teaching is required to give the true knowledge of the Gospel; it is an inward feeling of their adaptation to the wants of human nature, and a personal experience of their power upon his own heart. This is the real secret of ministerial strength. There is another branch of know ledge no less essential to the due discharge of the ministerial office--a knowledge of human nature. The hearts and consciences of men are the materials upon which the Christian minister’s labour is to be expended. He will study his own heart as the best guide to the knowledge of the hearts of others. The most eminently successful ministers have been most proficient in this knowledge.

II. The importance of this knowledge. This is evident from the nature of the case. The minister is a messenger: he must be conversant with all things essential to a clue execution of his commission. He is a teacher; and the people are to “seek the law at his mouth”: he must therefore be competent to expound it. He is a referee in cases of doubt and difficulty; he must be skilled to deal with every such case which may come before him. He is the depositary of the treasure of the Gospel; he must be able to dispense it with faithfulness. There are, at times, some special reasons why the Christian minister should be “a scribe well-instructed unto the kingdom of heaven.” Times which demand, if not a higher tone of piety, at least a higher standard of knowledge. There are some peculiar features in the present circumstances and position of the Church. The Christian ministry must take up a commanding position whence it may direct and control the progress of society. (W. Nicholson, M. A.)

A minister’s responsibility

Even strong and fearless Martin Luther confessed that he often trembled as he entered the pulpit. He could stand before kings and rulers without fear; but the responsibility of dealing with souls, and perhaps settling their destiny forever by his message, was to him so serious that he was wont to speak of “that awful place the pulpit.” Have none of us been betrayed into that cold officialism which speaks strongly in the pulpit, and acts coldly out of the pulpit? Have none of us acted the inconsistency of making the pulpit holy ground and all outside common? (A. J. Gordon, D. D.)

An unobtrusive minister

“I remember once riding on a coach,” remarked the late C. H. Spurgeon, “when the coachman observed to me he knew a certain minister (I will not say of what church) who, for the last six months, had been in the habit of riding up and down on the box of his coach with him; ‘and,’ says he, ‘he is a good sort of man, sir, a sort of man I like.’ ‘Well, what sort of a man is he?’ I asked. ‘Well, you see, sir,’ he replied, ‘he is a minister: and I like him because he never intrudes his religion, sir. I never heard him say a word, that would make me believe him a religious man, the whole six months he has ridden with me, sir!’“ I am afraid there are plenty of Christians of that sort: I am afraid the religion of such is not of much worth. They never intrude their religion; I think the reason it is so unobtrusive, is, that they have not any to intrude; for true godliness is one of the most intrusive things in the world. It is fire; and if you put fire down in your study, and give it most earnest admonition never to burn, you will find, while you are administering your sage advice, that a conflagration has commenced.

The duty of the Church in modern times

Did the conception of the Jewish priesthood given in this verse date from its original institution; was it part of the Mosaic legislation, or does it merely represent the ideal of the priesthood after the captivity? What does the prophet mean by “knowledge,” and what by “law”? Is it the ceremonial law only? Or, is the priest enjoined to instruct the Jews of the restoration in the law of moral conduct? An honest view of Scripture history requires us to make the wider and more comprehensive answer to these questions. With the pious Jew there was no divorce between religion and morality. And the Jewish priesthood was not only a sacrificing, it was also a teaching priesthood. Compare the Jewish priesthood with that of ancient Greece. The Greek religion knew nothing of instruction, or of preaching, in connection with temples or festivals. At first sight, Malachi’s words appear better suited to describe the prophet than the priest. But in truth, the priesthood, as an ideal, contained in itself the prophetic office as well. It is observable that the existence of organised prophetical schools in Israel appears just at those periods when the priesthood had ceased to be a witness to the truth. It was thus in the days of Samuel. The dearest desire of Samuel’s heart was to win Israel back to God, and teach them true worship as well as true morality. When David is on the throne, national order is restored, the worship of God has a permanent centre, and the law of God--moral and ceremonial--is authoritatively set forth and enforced, then the prophetical schools fall into the background, or even cease, and the prophetic office itself becomes an occasional and extraordinary channel of God’s grace. Later on, when religion and morality were in danger of extinction, under Elijah and Elisha the prophetical schools gained their moral and religious importance. But neither then did they imply any opposition to the ceremonial law. The true priest and the true prophet are at one. A right view of the Jewish priesthood is of importance toward a just estimate of the Christian ministry. You destroy the moral grandeur of the Jewish priest if you obliterate his prophetical function: and you miss the Divine ideal of the Christian ministry, if you see in it only a school of prophets, and forget that it is a teaching priesthood, with a fixed succession and a covenanted grace. None can deny the fact, that the Christian ministry has, to a very high degree, remembered and fulfilled its mission as a teaching priesthood, as a witness for the righteousness of God. But while we admire the powerful moral influence of the English clergy upon English morality, yet the very nature of this success helps to throw into stronger relief what appear to be its shortcomings. It may be seriously questioned whether the teaching of the Christian ministry has not tended to be too partial in its bearing upon Christian morals. The relation of the individual soul to God, the duty of man to himself and to his Maker,--these have naturally formed the principal theme of pulpit exhortation. But in that large field of duty which has regard to our fellow-men, it can hardly be said that the teaching, of divines has been equally forcible and instructive. It may be feared that the Sunday sermon often gives little practical guidance for the toiling millions around us. The Sunday teaching must not be an alien from the duties of the week, nor leave out three parts of life. The type of character the Church tends to form is the foundation for the highest virtues and widest usefulness. It aims at making a man more devout towards God, mindful of the unseen and spiritual, self-controlled and master of the passions, true and tender in his home, forgiving to his enemy, generous to the sick and poor. These virtues are never out of date. Our religion as set forth in our Divine Exemplar, or in the teachings of His apostles, shows no one-sidedness. The New Testament sets the relative duties as high as the personal. Religion is there made to consist very largely in justice and benevolence. The principles of Christian conduct remain the same; but their application varies--love of God, self-denial, love of neighbour; and these based upon the doctrines of the cross; exemplified by the life of Christ; lit up with the hope of glory. Let me indicate some of the questions which demand the religious treatment of the Christian teacher.

1. The subject of amusements.

2. The ethics of dress.

3. Relation to the fine arts, painting, sculpture, music, the drama. Or--

4. The laws concerning marriage and divorce.

5. Or consider the painful questions which arise out of the intensified vices of modern society; drunkenness, prostitution, bribery, commercial fraud.

I do not fear that the Church will lose in spirituality or humility, by addressing herself to problems like these. (E. L. Hicks.)