3:8 Will a {h} man rob God? Yet ye have robbed me. But ye say, Wherein have we robbed thee? In {i} tithes and offerings.
(h) There are none of the heathen so barbarous, that will defraud their gods of their honour, or deal deceitfully with them.
(i) By which the service of God should have been maintained, and the priests and the poor relieved.
3:7-12 The men of that generation turned away from God, they had not kept his ordinances. God gives them a gracious call. But they said, Wherein shall we return? God notices what returns our hearts make to the calls of his word. It shows great perverseness in sin, when men make afflictions excuses for sin, which are sent to part between them and their sins. Here is an earnest exhortation to reform. God must be served in the first place; and the interest of our souls ought to be preferred before that of our bodies. Let them trust God to provide for their comfort. God has blessings ready for us, but through the weakness of our faith and the narrowness of our desires, we have not room to receive them. He who makes trial will find nothing is lost by honouring the Lord with his substance.
