Mai. iv. 1, 2. Behold, the day cometh that shall burn, as an oven ; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble : and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. But unto you that fear my name, shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in his wings ; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.
THE thought of many is, that " God will do neither good nor evil/' and that it is therefore unnecessary and vain to make him an object either of our hope or fear. This was the state of mind in which the greater part of the Jews were in the time of Malachi : and God sent his prophet to warn them, that a time was coming when they should clearly discern between the righ- teous and the wicked by the awful judgments he would inflict on the one, and the unspeakable benefits he would confer on the other a.
In the words before us are contained,
I. A warning to the wicked —
The following context leads us immediately to the times of the Messiah ; and to them we must look for the accomplishment of this tremendous threatening —
[Temporal judgments are often predicted in similar lan- guage. The enemies of the Jewsb, and the Jews themselves0, yea, and all the enemies of Godd, are menaced in this manner. But never were they fulfilled so fearfully as in the destruction of Jerusalem. Thither almost all the whole Jewish nation were assembled ; and, being shut up in the city, as in an oven, they were made astonishing monuments of God's fiery indig- nation.]
But doubtless this warning refers also to the day of judgment —
[In that day the Judge himself will come in flames of firee: and the earth, the theatre on which so much wickedness has been acted, shall be burnt upf: and the objects of God's
a Zeph. i. 12. b Isai. x. 16—18. c Zeph. i. 14— IS.
d Ps. xxi. 8, 9. e 2 Thess. i. 7—0. f 2 Pet. iii. 10—12.