“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, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch” (Malachi 4:1).

This first day of summer, with its foretaste of still hotter days to come, may serve as a harbinger of an even more fearsome time of great heat that God has prophesied for the future, possibly coming sooner than we think. The prophet Malachi, in the last chapter of the Old Testament, has said (in our text) that that day “shall burn as an oven.”

The Apostle John says that the sun will “scorch men with . . . great heat” (Revelation 16:8,9). Isaiah foresaw that “the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left” (Isaiah 24:6). The prophet Joel in his vision of “the day of the LORD” saw that “the fire hath devoured the pastures of the wilderness, and the flame hath burned all the trees of the field. . . . the rivers of waters are dried up, . . .” (Joel 1:15,19,20). Even “the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up” (Revelation 16:12). Before this, the prophet warns that “the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up” (Revelation 8:7).

Indeed a fearsome summer is coming on the earth, and it will not be mere “global warming” caused by the burning of fossil fuels. The world has rejected its Creator and “the great day of His wrath” is coming soon (Revelation 6:17).

For those who have trusted their Creator and Redeemer, however, “God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Thessalonians 5:9). Our urgent business now is to warn men to “flee from the wrath to come” (Matthew 3:7). As Jude said: “Of some have compassion, making a difference. And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire” (Jude 22,23). HMM