Will You Be Joyful or Hiding When Jesus Returns?

O. T. #2361"Will You Be Joyful or Hiding When Jesus Returns?"

Jan. 20, 2023

Malachi 4

LET IT GLOW

Did you play Hide and Seek as a child? It hides their eyes while others hide, then goes to find them before they come to base, free from being the nest "it." Friend, we will not be able to hide when Jesus returns to earth. Will you be joyful or hiding?

Can you believe this is the very last chapter in the Old Testament? I'm not sure how long it has taken us. (I can't lift the tub that has my notebooks in it.) I know it has been a while. (Started this blog almost 12 years ago in the New Testament.) so I say thank you to those who have been faithfully reading and studying with me. I have learned so much. But what I have found is an Awesome God is each book.

We are going to read about the coming judgment:

• The arrogant and evildoer destroyed;
• The righteous delivered;
• The exhortation to remember Moses;
• The promise to send the New Elijah. [Liberty Bible Commentary]

I like how Tony Evans described the day that is coming:

It refers to the moment when Jesus Christ brings history to a climax. (1 Thess. 5:1-5) God always exercises His Sovereignty-He rules, controls, and governs all things. Absolutely nothing happens anywhere, anytime, anyhow that God does not either cause or allow. There's not a single hair that falls from your head of which He is not intimately aware. (Matt. 10:30) When Christ returns to earth on that final day, His sovereignty will be seen by all. Are you ready?

When the Day of the Lord, it will have a two-fold effect: bringing down the wicked and lifting up the righteous. It is only the righteousness of Jesus that clothes our soul, for we have none. None is righteous, no not one.

On that day, the Lord will show up and make all the wrongs right. He will come like an oven, a furnace, He intends to cleanse and purify, not coddle.

 

For our God is a consuming fire. (Hebrews 12:29)

*The wicked shall be as stubble. (verse 1)

 When we lived in the eastern part of our state, we saw what was left of the winter wheat fields after harvested-stubble. Then the farmer would burn the stubble off and nothing but ashes was left. 

Stubble is referred to as (dry) straw, in the Hebrew.

Our works will be revealed through fire. (1 Cor. 3:12-13)

*There will not be a root or branch of the wicked left. (verse 1) The entire tree will be destroyed, all of the wicked.

*The wicked will be as ashes, trampled under the feet. (verse 3) That is the answer to the question back in 3:14-What is gained by following the Lord? Victory over the unrighteous. 

That is a consolation for us-endure the wicked acts of the wicked, staying faithful to God.

LET IT GROW

Those that fear God (righteous) will be delivered during that time. They will be comforted by the Sun of Righteousness, the Messiah, Jesus Christ. It conveys images of a brilliant morning and the sun's rays going forth providing warmth, heat, and comfort to those under it. This is the only reference in the Bible of Jesus as the Sun of Righteousness.

There will be healing in His wings. It is a spiritual healing from sin and separation from the Lord. What a jubilation and celebration! Like a calf kept in a stall of a barn all winter, when let out, it jumps with excitement.

Are we skipping for joy when we think about Jesus coming to rule in the cruel wicked world? Are our loved ones ready?

LET IT GO

I can only imagine what that day will be like.

Whether in heaven or on earth at His second coming, all will bow before the Savior, Sun of Righteousness.

May we make the most of our time here-sharing who God is.