Malachi, Chapter 3

1. Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom you seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom you delight in: behold, he shall come, says the LORD of hosts.    2. But who may endure the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appears? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fullers' soap:    3. And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the LORD an offering in righteousness.    4. Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the LORD, as in the days of old, and as in former years.    5. And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those who oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and who turn aside the stranger from his right, and do not fear me, says the LORD of hosts.    6. For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed.    7. Even from the days of your fathers you have gone away from my ordinances, and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. But you said, How shall we return?    8. Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed me. But you say, How have we robbed you? In tithes and offerings.    9. You are cursed with a curse: for you have robbed me, even this whole nation.    10. Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and prove me now hereby, says the LORD of hosts, if I will not open for you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.    11. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruit of your ground; neither shall your vine drop her fruit before the time in the field, says the LORD of hosts.    12. And all nations shall call you blessed: for you shall be a delightful land, says the LORD of hosts.    13. Your words have been strong against me, says the LORD. Yet you say, What have we spoken so much against you?    14. You have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts?    15. And now we call the proud happy; yea, those who work wickedness are established; yea, those who tempt God are even delivered.    16. Then those who feared the LORD spoke often one to another: and the LORD listened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for those who feared the LORD, and who thought upon his name.    17. And they shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spares his own son that serves him.    18. Then shall you return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serves God and him that serves him not.