“For behold, the day is coming, burning like an oven, when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble. The day that is coming shall set them ablaze, says the LORD of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the LORD of hosts. Remember the law of my servant Moses, the statutes and rules that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel. “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction.”
Malachi 4:1-6, ESV
The theme of the Bible is the kingdom of God and in his thought-provoking book, Desiring the Kingdom, James K. A. Smith gives a helpful and broad definition of the kingdom that can apply to all people, not just Christians: “to be human is to desire ‘the kingdom,’ some version of the kingdom, which is the aim of our quest. Every one of us is on a kind of Arthurian quest for ‘the Holy Grail,’ that hoped-for, longed-for, dreamed-of picture of the good life—the realm of human flourishing—that we pursue without ceasing.”[1] So the kingdom is that “hoped-for, longed-for, dreamed-of picture of the good life” that gets us up in the morning. It could be God, His description of human flourishing, His dream for our lives, or some substitute, an idol of choice—something that seems right in our own eyes.
Interestingly, Malachi’s version of the “good life,” somewhat hidden within a larger context of impending judgment, is described above using three images:
- “the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings,”
- “you shall go out leaping like calves from the stall,” and
- “you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet.”
The first image refers to “the dawning of a new day ushering in an era of righteousness in which . . . [Israel] will experience the complete reversal of current circumstances.”[2] One scholar noted that light and salvation are synonymous in the Old Testament, “light being the sacramental sign of God’s love.”[3] Calvin and Luther further saw this as a Christological title. This interpretation is also reflected in the KJV’s translation where it capitalizes the title, “Sun of righteousness.”[4] Certainly, connecting this phrase with Christ is legitimate given that “the kingdom of God” can be defined as “the hope or expectation of Israel that finds its fulfillment in Jesus.”
The second image, “you shall go out leaping like calves from the stall,” refers to “a sense of carefree and energetic playfulness characteristic of tethered [and “well-fed”] calves released to pasture.”[5] The Hebrew word means literally to “frisk, paw the ground,”[6] and reminds me of a season of life when we owned two black, well-fed labs, Oliver and Sydney. Peaceful and secure inside their master’s house, they would suddenly start racing around like banshees in a spirit of carefree playfulness until Pam or I let them out to play!
The third image of the good life, “you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet,” is meant to convey the total conquest and eradication of evil. The enemy’s head is not only under the foot of the victor, symbolizing subjugation, but is “ashes,” denoting total destruction.
So, taking all three bulleted images together, Malachi’s picture of the “good life” is to be secure in the love of God—so secure and healed internally that one lives with a carefree playfulness, fearing nothing but God, courageously joining Him in the battle to overcome evil with good—a battle that cannot be lost (Rom. 8:31)!
[1] James K. A. Smith, Desiring the Kingdom (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009), 54–55.
[2] Andrew Hill, The Anchor Yale Bible: Malachi (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998), 349-350.
[3] Ibid., 350.
[4] Ibid., 349.
[5] Ibid., 353.
[6] Ibid., 352.