He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; He set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. Psalm 40:2.

I have set the Lord always before me. Because He is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Psalm 16:8.

The Lord lives! Blessed be my Rock! Let God be exalted, the Rock of my salvation! 2 Samuel 22:47 NKJV.

And in our chapter, Malachi 3, Creator God – Father, Son, Spirit, gives hope most amazing. “I will send My messenger, who will prepare the way before Me. Then suddenly the Lord you are seeking will come to His temple; the messenger of the covenant, whom you desire, will come,” says the Lord Almighty. v. 1. And just as those words came true, they will come true again when Jesus, the Son, returns. Then we will see all we put our trust in, built on human understanding alone, for what it was. Unstable and changing. But who can endure the day of His coming? Who can stand when He appears? For He will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; He will purify the Levites and refine them like gold and silver. Then the Lord will have men who will bring offerings in righteousness, and the offerings of Judah and Jerusalem will be acceptable to the Lord, as in days gone by, as in former years. “So I will come to put you on trial. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widow and the fatherless, and deprive the foreigner among you of justice, but do not fear Me,” says the Lord Almighty. “I the Lord do not change. So you, the descendants of Jacob are not destroyed. Ever since the time of your ancestors you have turned away from My decrees and have not kept them. Return to Me, and I will return to you,” says the Lord Almighty. v. 2-7. Everything changes when we return to the Lord, our Creator. The foundations on shifting sand collapse under the weight of their inadequacy. “But you ask, ‘How are we to return?’ Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob Me. But you ask, ‘How are we robbing You?’ In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse – your whole nation – because you are robbing Me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house. Test Me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not drop their fruit before it is ripe,” says the Lord Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the Lord Almighty. “You have spoken arrogantly against Me,” says the Lord. “Yet you ask, ‘What have we said against You?’ You have said, ‘It is futile to serve God. What do we gain by carrying out His requirements and going about like mourners before the Lord Almighty? But now we call the arrogant blessed. Certainly evildoers prosper, and even when they put God to the test, they get away with it.’” v. 7-15.

Can we see our present world in these words in Malachi? What do we gain by trusting God? What provision has He ever denied you? He asks us to give tithes so others can be blessed. He doesn’t need the tithes or the food or the fruit of the vine. He provides everything! It is all His! When we return to Him, something fundamental and needed shifts. We are witnessing today, just as generations past witnessed and lived through, the collapsing of foundations built on shifting sand. Instead of being afraid, turn to Creator God. Hold fast to Him. He will give you strength and hope even in a world choosing to follow its ways to its needed ruin. How else can we account for the events happening in our world? I was listening on the news last night as a representative of the Hispanic coalition of Christians was stressing how the American Empire needs to survive, that the whole world is counting on just that. I had to turn it off. Shifting sand saves no one. Jesus, the Son, isn’t coming to save the American Empire, the Russian Empire, or any empire of men. He is coming to save us from empire and bring us into the Kingdom of God. Do our human empires perjure, defraud laborers of their wages, oppress widows and the fatherless, deprive foreigners among us of justice, commit crimes of every kind…but do not fear Creator God by doing so? Can we see His truth of all that needs to be purified? The Lord does not change. What was wrong then is wrong now. Shifting sand. When you have had enough of shifting sand, take God’s hand. Let Him teach you a better way with Him that is for all eternity and is so Good! Following as God leads does not result in our going about like mourners! Far from it. We live blessed because we have found what is true. Creator God. Open your eyes and your heart and your spirit. You are loved by Creator God. He will be your help and your strength and your hope. The Lord lives! Blessed be my Rock! Let God be exalted, the Rock of our salvation!