Malachi 3 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

Watch: I am sending my messenger, and he will clear the road ahead of me. Then all at once the Lord you keep asking for will come to his temple, the messenger of the agreement, the one you want. He is coming, says Yahweh who commands armies.

But who can live through the day he comes? Who is left standing when he shows up? He is like the fire in a metalworker's furnace, like the lye a launderer scrubs with.

He will sit there melting and straining silver. He will strain the sons of Levi and put them through the fire like gold and silver, until they are the kind of men who bring Yahweh an offering done right.

Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will taste good to Yahweh, the way it did in the old days, in years long gone.

I will come to you for the trial, and I will be quick to testify against the ones who work magic, against the ones who cheat on their wives, against the ones who swear to what they know is false, against the men who cheat a hired worker out of his pay, who lean on the widow and the orphan, who push the immigrant aside, and who have no fear of me, says Yahweh who commands armies.

I am Yahweh, and I do not change. That is the only reason you children of Jacob have not been finished off.

Ever since your ancestors you have turned away from my rules and not kept them. Come back to me, and I will come back to you, says Yahweh who commands armies. And you ask, "How are we supposed to come back?"

Can a person rob God? But you are robbing me. And you ask, "How have we robbed you?" In the tenth, and in the gifts you promised.

You are under a curse, every one of you, the whole nation, because you are robbing me.

Bring the whole tenth into the storehouse, so there is food in my house. Test me on this, says Yahweh who commands armies, and see whether I do not throw open the windows of the sky and pour out on you more good than you have room for.

I will hold the devourer off your crops, so the fruit of your ground is not ruined, and the vine in your field will not drop its grapes before they ripen, says Yahweh who commands armies.

Then every nation will call you well off, because you will be a land people want to be in, says Yahweh who commands armies.

Your words about me have been hard, says Yahweh. And you ask, "What have we said against you?"

You have said, "There is nothing in it for us in serving God. What did we get out of keeping his charge, or going around in mourning clothes in front of Yahweh who commands armies?"

"So now we say the arrogant are the ones who have it good. People who do harm get built up. They push God to see what he will do, and they walk away fine."

Then the people who feared Yahweh talked it over with each other. Yahweh listened and heard them, and a scroll of remembrance was written up in front of him, listing the ones who fear Yahweh and hold his name in their minds.

They will be mine, says Yahweh who commands armies, my own treasure on the day I act. I will go easy on them the way a man goes easy on the son who works alongside him.

Then you will see the difference again between a person who does right and a person who does wrong, between the one who serves God and the one who never bothered.