09-22-2025 PART 1: Treasured and Set Apart Malachi’s Scroll of Remembrance

Section 1

Malachi 3:16 spotlights a people who “fear the Lord” and talk together about Him—so much so that God listens and a “scroll of remembrance” records their names and their God-centered thoughts. The emphasis is delight: loving to think about the Lord, lifting our eyes when life is hard, and joining others in thankful worship. This “fear” is not terror but awe, reverence, and grateful devotion—God notices not only our spoken words but the meditations of our hearts, and He deems this mindful devotion significant enough to memorialize.

Section 2

God answers that devotion with identity and affection: “They will be my people…my own special treasure,” and He promises fatherly compassion—“I will spare them as a father spares an obedient child.” The message dismantles the caricature of a harsh, experimental deity; instead, God treasures His people. To be His treasure is to be seen, shepherded, and safeguarded. The intimate moments in Scripture—when insight leaps from familiar pages and feels like God saying, “Look!”—become tokens of that treasured status, worthy of jotting down in our own little “journals of remembrance.”

Section 3

Then comes the line of separation (3:18): God will make visible the difference between the righteous and the wicked, those who serve and those who refuse. Holiness isn’t flawlessness; it’s “set-apartness”—God’s property, distinct from the world. That distinction doesn’t fuel smugness; it fuels mission and mercy. We ache for the resistant, yet we affirm accountability before God and take hope in the promise of life with Him—real comfort for the saints now with Christ and a steady compass for those who remain. Loving, serving, and thinking on the Lord marks us as His—and He writes it down.