Dear Friends of "Dial Daily Bread,"
The last words of the Old Testament give us hope. The Lord Jehovah (or Yahweh--no one seems sure how to pronounce the sacred name) promises to send us "Elijah the prophet" on a blessed mission of reconciling hearts that are estranged.
But tucked in our very last Old Testament phrase is this ominous word from the Lord: "Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse" (Mal. 4:6). On the surface it appears to be a terrible threat of severe divine retribution if we treat the returning Elijah as Ahab's and Jezebel's Israel treated him long ago. The Lord appears to cap the Old Testament off with a final thunder appeal to raw fear--"straighten up or else!"
If we do a little research in the Old Testament about a "curse" and the suffering land, we come up with an interesting truth: whatever "curse" comes on the land is the direct result of the sin and rebellion of the people--not an arbitrary act of personal vengeance on the part of God. In a consistent pattern in the Bible, He takes the blame for evil that He does not (or cannot) prevent in this world of sin. He even takes the blame for the death of His Son, Jesus (see Isaiah 53:10, "Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief," yet we know well that it was the scribes and Pharisees who tortured and murdered Him!).
There is an extended essay in Isaiah 24:1-6ff about how to understand what appears to be a "curse [from the Lord that] has devoured the earth." The picture appears to be a dramatic divine temper tantrum of "scattering abroad its inhabitants" and turning the poor earth upside down, etc., when in reality the truth is that "the earth is defiled under its inhabitants, because they have transgressed the laws, ... broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore the curse has devoured the earth ..."
Stop and do a little thinking. "Elijah" is here; he wants to save us from destroying ourselves! Let's listen. A godly physician in my childhood told us, "There are more blessings in God's curses than in man's benedictions."
--Robert J. Wieland
From the "Dial Daily Bread" Archive: March 23, 2006.
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