Smoodock's Blog

For the most part, the New Testament begins with the preaching of John the Baptist. He was sent to, among other things, introduce the Messiah to his people, the Jews. In my previous study on the motif of the eschatology of the parables, I mentioned that John’s ministry was in perfect harmony with Jesus’ Parable of the Wheat and the Tares. We are told that John warned the Jewish authorities of the coming judgment of the nation (Matthew 3:7, 10) at the hand of the Messiah (Matthew 3:12). Moreover, he went on to say that at the time of the harvest the Messiah would separate the grain from the chaff, i.e. the believers from the unbelievers, burn the chaff in the fire and save the grain in his barn.

It is interesting to consider John’s ministry, in the light of how Jesus defined him. Just after Jesus’ Transfiguration, Peter, James and John asked him about the prophecy that told of Elijah’s coming, and Jesus said Elijah truly would come, according to the prophecy, and has, in fact, come already (Matthew 17:10-13). The Apostles knew, then, that Jesus had referred to John the Baptist (cf. Matthew 11:13-14). So, if John was Elijah who was to come to restore all things, what was Elijah supposed to have done in order to restore all things?

For, 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, says 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. And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, says the LORD of hosts. Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: (Malachi 4:1-5)

The prophet declared that Elijah would come to warn of the day that would burn as an oven or a furnace (H8574). The same Hebrew word is used in Genesis 15:17 for the Lord making a covenant with Abraham, and there the Lord, himself, is described as a smoking furnace. So, according to the message Elijah / John the Baptist was to preach, a day is coming when the proud and the wicked will be as stubble before a furnace, which shall burn them up (Malachi 4:1). This judgment will leave them (i.e. the stubble in Malachi; chaff in Matthew 3:12) neither root nor branch (Malachi), which refers to the axe on the root of the tree in Matthew 3:10. It refers to judgment upon the nation. It would be destroyed and not left to the wicked.

Nevertheless, the elect who fear the name of the Lord (verse-2) will be saved and fed in the barn (the Lord’s place of safety, as in Matthew 13:30, 43). Truly, it would be for the vindication of these righteous that the Lord would destroy the wicked and their land (verse-3), viz. the wicked would be ashes under the feet of the righteous (cf. Romans 16:20). Their judgment comes, because they had made the Law of Moses (verse-3) of no effect through their vain traditions (cf. Matthew 15:5-6), and though they were warned by John the Baptist and later through the Gospel, they refused to repent. Rather they persecuted those Jesus sent to them from city to city, killing some and wounding others (Matthew 23:34).

Therefore, the great and terrible Day of the Lord had come upon them to judge them and vindicate the righteous elect, who kept warning them to repent (Malachi 4:4). The interesting point here is this. The Lord, himself, had identified who Elijah was, and that is John the Baptist. Elijah / John the Baptist came in the first century AD saying the great and terrible Day of the Lord was near. Even before he actually introduced Jesus, John claimed the winnowing fork (a harvest tool) was already in the Messiah’s hand (Matthew 3:12), so the end of the age, which is the time of the harvest (Matthew 13:39) was at that very time, at hand. Jesus was already separating the righteous from the unrighteous.

In order for the futurists doctrine of a yet future coming of Christ to be true, there would have to be two comings of Jesus in judgment and two great and terrible days of the Lord, because John was sent immediately before that day to restore all things (Malachi 4:4), and Jesus identified John as Elijah. To say that Jesus’ judgment of the Jews in 70 AD didn’t completely fulfill the scriptures, is to deny that John was Elijah and to say Jesus made a mistake in identifying him as such, because the scriptures do not predict a second Elijah, nor do they foretell two comings of Jesus in judgment.