Malachi 4:1

MALACHI CHAPTER 4 God's judgment on the wicked, Zechariah 4:1, and his blessing on the good, Zechariah 4:2,3. He exhorteth to the study of the law, Zechariah 4:4, and telleth of Elijah's coming and office, Zechariah 4:5,6. The words immediately foregoing (which, as we have the Chapter s divided, did end the third chapter) foretold a day to come then, though it is now long since past, in which such judgments should be executed upon the Jewish nation, as should make the stoutest contemners of God to see and acknowledge his different respects and providences toward the good and toward the evil. Now in this verse (which continueth the discourse) he accounteth how it should be. Behold; mark well what now the Lord doth foretell The day, before mentioned, the day of visitation and discerning of men, cometh; though it be at some four hundred years distance from you, yet it is coming, and will overtake you, and overwhelm you too about that time; nay, you shall have some tastes of bitter cups before, some less and shorter troubles, the presage and assurance of that dreadful day I now speak of, saith our prophet. That shall burn as an oven: the refiner's fire, Zechariah 3:2, is now represented to us as a fire burning more dreadfully, which really was more dreadful in the fulfilling than here it is in the prediction; when Jerusalem and the temple were on fire, and none could quench it; when the fire raged every where, but burnt most fiercely where the arched roofs did make it, as in ovens or furnaces, to double itself, and infold flames with flames, and with dreadful roarings increased its terrors. This day may well be an emblem of the day of judgment, and this place may be accommodated thereto, but it principally speaks of the times of vengeance on Jerusalem in its final desolation. All the proud; such as are described Zechariah 1:13, Zechariah 3:13-15. All that do wickedly: this is another part of the character of these persons, and explicatory of the former passage; proud men, such as the text mentions, will be wicked workers. Shall be stubble; dried and cast into the oven, consumed as soon as cast in. The day that cometh; of which already, Zechariah 3:17, and in this verse. Shall burn them up; totally and speedily consume them. Saith the Lord of hosts; added to confirm the certainty of the thing; the Lord of hosts hath said it shall be, and he can do what he saith he will. It shall leave them neither root nor branch; in allusion to the utter extirpation of trees for the fire, whose branches lopped off, the body cleft, and the roots stocked up, and all cast into the fire; so that nothing remains but the ashes, into which all is turned: and this was fully accomplished upon the irreligious Jews, when the Romans burnt their city and temple, and destroyed the people.