What is the "great and dreadful day of the Lord" (Malachi 4:5)?

In these closing words the minds of the people were not only carried back to Moses, but also onward to Elijah, as we see in verse 5. Through Moses the law had been given. By Elijah the ten tribes had been recalled to God and His law, in days when they were almost swamped by the worship of Baal. Before the coming of the predicted day of the Lord an 'Elijah' is to appear. We may remember that when John the Baptist was asked if he were Elijah, he answered, No. Yet he came in the spirit and power of Elijah, so that in regard to the first coming our Lord could say, 'If ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come' (Matt. 11:14).

But the first coming of our Lord was the introduction of the day of grace. It is His second coming in power and glory that will introduce 'the great and dreadful day of the Lord'. Hence, we judge, this prediction in its fulness must still await its fulfilment. In Revelation 11:3-6, we read of 'two witnesses', marked by features in their testimony, reminiscent of Moses and Elijah, and these precede the second coming of the Lord. We may connect the Elijah of our verse with one of these. What we can say with assurance is that God ever raises up adequate witness, and gives adequate warning, before He acts in judgment.

Jehovah, moreover, lays the foundation in this exhortation, and in the principle which it contains, for the announcement of the mission of Elijah the prophet, before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. (v. 5.) We have explained the relation of John the Baptist to Elijah in connection with Mal. 3:1. If Israel, when our Lord first came, had received the Baptist, he would have been Elijah for them, and as it was his mission was in the spirit and the power of Elijah. But John was beheaded, and the Christ, of whom he was the forerunner, was crucified; and God, who is as immutable in His holiness as in His grace, will as surely perform His truth unto Abraham, as execute his judgments upon the wicked. In the day of judgment, however, He remembers mercy, and therefore, before the advent of the great and dreadful day of the Lord, He will send Elijah to test the hearts of His people, and to recall them to His unchanging faithfulness and grace. And the very mention of Elijah is significant of the state in which Israel will then be found. The mission of Elijah, historically, was at a time of general apostacy, when Jehovah had been publicly disowned, and Baal had been chosen in His place. And we gather from many scriptures that apostacy will characterize Israel as a whole in the last days. As in the time of Ahab there was a hidden remnant, so will it be again, for God will never leave Himself without witness on the earth. But outwardly, under the sway of Antichrist, idolatry will mark the condition of the people. The mission of "Elijah" will be in the midst of this state of things, and the character of his ministry in the time of Ahab and Jezebel will enable us to understand its nature at the end. Its object is here given: "And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." (v. 6.) John the Baptist never fulfilled this promise, at least in the largeness of its import. Crowds gathered about him at the commencement of his labours, but the most of these only rejoiced in his light for a season, and then turned back to the darkness of their own pride and self-righteousness. With "Elijah" it will be different, for the Lord hath spoken the word, and He will perform it. Labouring as the prophet will, under far greater difficulties than even the Baptist, the effects of his work, if not outwardly seen, will be greater; and in this way there will be once again a people prepared for the Lord on His return. The object, however, here is, "Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse." There will be judgments, as we have seen from verse 1; but the existence of a people whom God has called and prepared in grace will once again be the salt of the earth, and on their account the earth, or more probably the land, will be exempted from that which is here termed a curse — pure and unmingled judgment.

The whole chapter is a future prophecy. While there has been a partial fulfillment of the first verse of the third chapter, everything in this concluding chapter awaits its fulfillment. Elijah the prophet is announced. John the Baptist came in the Spirit and power of Elijah, but he was not the Elijah promised here. If ye will receive it, said our Lord, this is Elijah who should come. It was a testimony to faith and not the fulfillment of Malachi's prophecy. If the Jews had accepted Christ, John would have been Elijah. Our Lord bears witness to this. "Elias truly shall come first and restore all things. But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them." When the age closes another one will appear, the Elijah announced by Malachi, who does his work of restoration before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. His work will be carried on among the people Israel. Deceivers and impostors have occasionally arisen who claimed to be this Elijah; the most prominent in recent years is the Dowieite delusion of Zion City. Such is the havoc produced by not dividing the Word of Truth rightly.

When the Lord Jesus in humiliation was led as a lamb to the slaughter, He said to His enemies, "This is your hour, and the power of darkness" (Luke 22:53). But the tables are to be completely turned. He comes not in humiliation, but in glory; not as a lamb to the slaughter, but as the Lion of the tribe of Judah; not solitary and alone, but "with ten thousands of His saints"; not submitting to the will of His enemies, but that His enemies may be made His footstool. It is not man's little hour, and the short-lived triumph of evil; it is the great and dreadful day of the Lord.

"The day of the Lord" is not a day of twenty-four hours, but an interval of time like "the day of salvation." It is a period in the cycle of "times and seasons" marked by the absolute supremacy and authority of the Lord. It starts with His public manifestation in the clouds of heaven - His appearing with His saints.

The great day of the Lord is now more fully described. It is the day when the announced judgment will take place. Higher criticism sees nothing but some invasion of the land by hostile forces. But it is the same great day, the culmination of the past ages, when Jehovah is revealed, so vividly described in Joel 2:11. On that day the voice of the Lord will be heard (Psa. 29; Isa. 66:6). When that day comes the mighty man will cry out in bitterness, for he is unable to save himself from the judgment tempest. In two verses the prophet describes vividly the greatness of that day.

A day of wrath is that day, A day of trouble and distress, A day of ruin and desolation, A day of darkness and gloom, A day of clouds and cloudy darkness; A day of the trumpet and the war cry Against the fortified cities, And against the lofty battlements.

The prophet's first utterance is concerning the day, "Howl ye! Alas for the day! For the day is near, even the day of the Lord is near, a cloudy day; it shall be the time of the Gentiles." What day is this? Other prophets mention the day of Jehovah as a day of judgment and wrath when the Lord will deal in His righteousness with the nations of the earth (Isa. 2, 13:6, 9; Joel 1:15, 2:1, 11, 3:14; Amos 5:18, 20; Obad. 15; Zeph. 1:7, 14; Zech. 14:1, etc). This day in its final meaning is the day on which the Lord Jesus Christ will be visibly revealed from heaven. It is mentioned in the New Testament in 1 Thess. 5:2; 2 Thess. 2:2 (where "day of Christ" should be rendered "day of the Lord") and 2 Peter 3:10. This day will bring "man's day" to a close and usher in a new age, when righteousness shall reign as grace reigns now. This day of coming judgment of all nations is seen also here in a prophetic perspective. All previous judgments of nations as announced by God's prophet's, nations which sinned against Israel the chosen people, foreshadow the one great day, when the times of the Gentiles end in the revealed manner (Dan. 2:34, 7:10-14). What came upon Egypt in the past through divine judgment will happen to the Gentile nations in the future at the close of our age, "when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ" (2 Thess. 1:7-8). Ever since the times of the Gentiles began with Nebuchadnezzar the divinely appointed head (Jer. 27:4-8), this day of the Lord has been drawing near, till now, with the stupendous present-day events, we can see this day rapidly approaching.

The day of the Lord is constantly referred to in the prophets. It always has in view the day of the Lord’s intervention in judgment upon the earth, leading to the restoration of Israel, and the blessing of the nations. It is the day when the Lord intervenes in the affairs of this world, dealing with all the evil, and bring in all the blessings of His reign.

These believers would know that the prophets spoke of this day as "The great and dreadful day of the Lord" (Mal. 4:5); "a day of trouble, and distress, a day of wasteness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness" (Zeph. 1:14-15). Thus, however great the glory and blessing of the reign of Christ, the day of the Lord, that leads to the Kingdom, would be ushered in by overwhelming judgments on the world.

The term "The day of the Lord" is introduced in Isaiah 2:12, and "that day" is frequently referred to by the prophet. That day begins with the Lord coming in judgment for the salvation of His people, and will bring in the blessings the remnant have waited for down the ages. It will be the Lord's "day of vengeance" on the wicked, but the day of salvation for the righteous. Peter shows that the day of the Lord will bring, at its close, the passing away of the present heavens and earth, to make way for the new heavens and the new earth to introduce "the day of God" (2 Peter 3:10-12).

The expression 'the day of Jehovah' is found frequently in the Old Testament; 'the day of the Lord' in the New Testament. This 'day', which is always presented as a future time or event, is characterized by judgments which will strike suddenly men and nations on the earth.