I often find it to be the case
that where my friends see darkness and gloom, I see opportunity
and blessing, both in the scriptures and in experience. I'm not an
optimist. I see things as I believe. They are plainly revealed in
the book of God. I hear folks talk about our day
and I often speak of the darkness of this day. But I want you to
understand that in this dark, dark day, we are given great
light and we are given great opportunity and the Lord God
has opened great doors of utterance for the gospel of his grace.
I wouldn't prefer had I the choice to live and serve our God in
any other day. Back in the book of Malachi,
the prophet Malachi is closing out the Old Testament scriptures,
giving us the last word God would give to his people for 400 years. And Malachi lived in a dark,
dark day, a dark day. The worship of God had been for
the most part reduced to nothing but outward activity and the
activity itself was abominable. The priest, those men who were
responsible to guide God's people at God's altar, those men who
were responsible to show God's people the way to God Almighty,
both by instruction, by precept, and by their activity as sacrificing
priests to God, took the things the people brought and used them
for their own gain, to gratify their own lust, and they mocked
God in his house. And Malachi sharply reproved
them. They robbed God. They robbed God, not just robbing
him of tithes and offerings, robbing him of the sacrifices
men brought to his house, but robbing him of his glory in his
house. They robbed God. But even in
the midst of that, Malachi speaks of God's covenant, standing firm. with one man, one priest, Jesus
Christ, the God-man, our mediator. Even before Christ came in the
flesh, he stood as our covenant surety, and he was that man whom
God trusted with his glory, with his covenant, and with his people.
And Malachi's last word, as he closes out this prophecy, as
I have studied this book and tried to find God's messages
for you in this book of Malachi, I found it astounding that almost
everything I've read speaks of Malachi's prophecy as a book
of severe judgment. And it is that. It is that the
gospel is judgment upon those who will not believe. But Malachi's
prophecy is full of expectation. It's full of promised grace. It's full of goodness and mercy. Malachi's last word concerning
the things about which he's written we find in chapter 4 and verse
2. Look at it. In verse 1 he talks about judgment.
How God's going to consume the earth in his judgment. He'll
judge the wicked with the brightness of Christ's coming. He'll cast
off those who believe not God. He'll cast the wicked into hell
forever. But Oh, thank God when God speaks
of judgment, there's always a but. But unto you that fear my name. Malachi is speaking now as God's
messenger to God's people, to those who believe God and worship
him in spirit and in truth. to those who had not succumbed
to the wicked influences around them, but rather they held firm
the truth of God and worshiped God at His altar. They feared
God's name. That is, they worshipped Him
in the totality of His being, His name representing what He
is. They worshipped Him as He made
Himself known. Unto you that fear my name, shall
the son of righteousness arise. There's a day coming when he
whom you trust, he whom you believe, He whom you know as your Lord
and your Savior, He to whom you look for all things, He shall
indeed come. The Son, S-U-N, who is the Son,
S-O-N, of righteousness shall indeed arise in this earth. And
when He does, He will arise with healing in His wings. Now those words, as I told you
in the last message I preached several weeks ago from this chapter,
certainly may apply and do rightly apply to our Lord Jesus in his
incarnation. They definitely speak of the
coming of Christ in his incarnation. Elijah will come first as the
herald of the Messiah, preparing the way. And that Elijah is John
the Baptist. That clearly speaks of Christ's
coming incarnation of his first advent in the world. He is the
promised Messiah for whom God's people looked. And the Lord is
here making a promise. Your hope is not in vain. He
shall arise. And when he does, he'll set everything
straight. They're going to be healing in
his wings. And these words clearly speak of the Lord Jesus coming
in his second advent, the glory of his second advent. We often
will read these words of promise in the Old Testament as well
as in the new. And he's over this. Is this referring
to the Lord's first coming or second coming? Yes. Yes. It refers to both. For the advent
of Christ in his first advent and in his second advent is really
just the one coming of our Redeemer. First he comes by which he will
execute redemption by the sacrifice of himself. And then finally
consummate redemption by the coming judgment on this earth
and the everlasting glory of his people in resurrection glory.
So this word speaks also of our Lord's second coming. But I want
us tonight to Look at this word in a very personal way. Without
question, the promise that's given in our text is a promise
of God's grace and the coming of Christ Jesus to his people
in the saving operations of his grace. When Christ comes to chosen
sinners. Oh, how I pray he will come to
you now. Right now. He will come to you. When he comes, The prophet says,
speaking for God, the triune God, unto you that fear my name
shall the son of righteousness arise with healing in his wings
and ye shall go forth and grow up as calves of the stall. Now, in this one statement, God
inspired his prophet Malachi to use five distinct yet intimately
connected metaphors to show us what happens when Christ comes
in saving grace to chosen redeemed sinners. This is what happens
when he comes initially, and this is what happens when he
comes in the many visits he makes to us in the sweet manifestation
of himself after once we've known him. First understand in this
context, when the prophet says, you that fear my name, to you
that fear my name, God says the son of righteousness shall arise.
Let us never have the idea that our faith in him is the cause
of his coming to us. Our faith in Him is the result
of Him coming to us, yet our faith in Him is the cause of
our apprehension of that coming. To you who believe, oh hear me,
do you believe on the Son of God? Do you fear God? Do you worship the living God
as he reveals himself in the totality of his being? Believe
on the son of God and the son of righteousness shall arise
in your soul. First of all, he tells us that
he comes as a rising sun. And then he shines with beings
of righteousness when he comes. When he arises, he arises with
healing in his wings. And fourth, when the Lord Jesus
comes, when the son of righteousness arises, he breaks stalled calves
out of the stall. And then he makes the free calves
of grace to be leaping calves in the open field. All right,
here's the first thing. The Lord Jesus, the prophet tells
us, comes to his people as a rising sun. The sun of righteousness
shall arise. Oh, what a blessed day that is. Any day when the sun rises with
brightness, when the sun rises in your soul, when the sun rises
in your heart, the sun of righteousness I'm speaking of. The psalmist
said, the Lord God is a son and a shield. The Lord will give
grace and glory. The Lord is a son. Those are the words of the psalmist.
Those are the words of the prophet Malachi. They are rightly applied
to all three persons of the Holy Trinity. But specifically, the
prophet is talking about the coming of the Lord Jesus. And
what a great representation that is of him. The sun is central. The sun is the center of our
solar system. It's the center of everything
in our solar system. Everything, somehow or another,
is connected with and depends on the sun. The sun is the central
thing. And so it is with Jesus Christ,
our Redeemer. He's the center of everything. In the church of God, Christ
is the center. He is that cohesive element that
holds us together. He is that one in whom we are
unified and made one. He is the center of his church,
the center of worship, the center of all truth. He is the center
of the word of God. He is the center of the decrees
of God. He is the center of the will
of God. He's the center of the revelation
of God. He's the center of the knowledge
of God. And he is center in his church so that we come together
in his name for his glory to worship him. who is the son of
righteousness, the central one, that one in whom we trust is
the one we adore and worship, whose glory we seek in all things
and above all things. Now, I stress that. I stress
it because I want you, young and old alike, never, never,
never to tolerate anything less. In our worship services, Christ
must be central. Central. And when I say central,
I mean he is that one who is in and the consummation of everything. Every song ought to exalt Christ
the Lord, lead us to Christ the Lord, direct our hearts to praise
our Redeemer. Every message Every message ought
to be full of Jesus Christ crucified. Indeed, if it is not, any sermon
that is not full of Christ crucified, any sermon that is not the preaching
of Jesus Christ crucified is a crime in conception and in
execution and in hearing. Jesus Christ crucified is everything
in his church and kingdom. We pray. You men leading congregation
in public prayer, I appreciate the fact that as you read the
scriptures and and lead the congregation in prayer, you're conscious that
you are leading the congregation and you lead the people of God
to the throne of God, to worship God. to bow before Him. You humble your hearts before
Him and humble the congregation before Him. And you seek to adore
Him. You seek His will. You seek His
honor. You seek to know Him. Christ
is the center of everything. Not only is the Son central,
when Christ comes, the Son of righteousness, when He rises
upon the soul with healing in His wings, He brings light with
him and we begin to see. We see things in light until
Christ comes. Everything's darkness. Everything's
darkness. And we can't see. We can't see. Christ is the light
of the world, and he is the light that shines in our hearts to
give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. Until he
arises, there's no seeing. But when he comes, when he arises
in the soul, then we who before walked in darkness walk in light,
and we see things in the light. We see ourselves as we really
are. We see ourselves as we really
are. If the sun ever shines in your
heart, your pretense of goodness will
just be shattered. Your thoughts of your superiority your thoughts of your righteousness,
your thoughts of your holiness, your thoughts that somehow you
are indeed worthy of God's favor wither and you wither before
the sun shining. When Christ shines, we see Christ
himself, the revelation of God, and salvation by him. We see
how that God now indeed is just and justifies the ungodly by
the sacrifice of his son. We see now how that sinners are
made righteous not by their doing but by him and by his doing.
Made righteous by the free gift of God's grace. We see the affairs
of the world and the world itself for what it is. Solomon writes
in the book of Ecclesiastes and writes with clarity. Clarity
which, frankly, lost religious people commenting about what
he writes can't comprehend. He says, as he looks around him,
as he looks around him, I said, it's a couple. Love each other,
don't you? Join together. Vanity of vanities. You mean this is vanity? Well,
this is the best there is in this world. It is, isn't it? And it's just vanity. It's just
a passing thing of time. Just a passing thing of time. Oh, I can't tell you how that
reproves me. How that rebukes me. God teach
me. that everything here is just
a passing thing of time. Vanity of vanities, all is vanity. You mean the whole world? Everything
in it? Everything connected with it?
All its relationships? All its riches? All its pains? All its joys? All its sorrows? Vanity of vanities! All is vanity. just a passing thing of time. That's all. That's all. That's
not someone speaking because they've
got a bad problem with depression. That's a man speaking by inspiration
of God, the Holy Spirit, because that's the way things really
are. That's where they really are. And the sooner you see it,
the more content and peaceful you're going to be in this world,
living in this world and leaving this world. When Christ comes,
when the son of righteousness arises upon our souls, he he
causes us. To see eternal things. I have not seen nor heard, neither
had to enter into the heart of man the things which God has
prepared for them that love him, but God hath revealed them to
us by His Spirit. I can't begin to comprehend the
little bit that I know about eternal things. But oh, my soul,
soon I shall awake in His likeness and shall be satisfied. Soon
I shall be made like my Redeemer. Soon all sorrow and sighing shall
be over and former things passed away. Paul said, Our light of
fiction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding
and eternal weight of glory, while we look not at the things
that are seen, but the things which are not seen. For the things
which are seen are temporal. The things that are not seen
are eternal. Brother Ron just read in 1 Peter chapter 1 about
our faith. Not our faith, but the trial
of your faith. The trial of your faith is worth
more than a mountain of gold. Because it works for you. A far more exceeding and eternal
weight of glory. I take that to mean at least
this. Heaven will be far more glorious
as we behold our Savior face to face in his eternal glory
than it otherwise could be by the trials through which he brings
us to that everlasting glory. But sometimes the sun is obscured. Sometimes it's eclipsed. Yesterday was a bright, shiny
day. You could look at it anytime
during the day and look up in the sky and see the sun. Today,
you couldn't see it for anything. From morning to right now, it'd
been cloudy and overcast. The sun's shining. The sun's
just as bright as it was yesterday, but there are thick, heavy clouds
in the air so that you can't see the sun shining. Yet you're
conscious that it is. If it weren't shining, you couldn't
walk. If it weren't shining, you'd be stumbling around. If
it weren't shining, you couldn't look out there across the parking
lot and see the cow out there in the field. If it weren't shining,
you couldn't see those things. So on those days when the sun
is hidden behind the clouds, you walk in the light of the
sun, but everything is dull. So it is. In the grace of God. The sun of righteousness doesn't
always shine brightly in our souls. We don't always feel the
Lord's presence gladdening our hearts. The sun of righteousness
is often hidden behind thick, dark, heavy clouds. And yet,
the light in which we walk, though it's not as bright as it was
the day before, it is the light of Christ Jesus the Lord shining
the same as ever. We walk in the light of living. And as the sun sets in the evening, sometimes
it sets too in our souls. It seems that the Lord Jesus
is gone from us. And sometimes we cry, art thou
clean, gone forever? Are your mercies, O Lord, clean,
gone forever? Have you altogether forsaken
me? But the sun of righteousness
arises again. at the appointed season, and
then what rejoicing. And when the sun of righteousness
arises, something comes. It's shining, brings warmth and
heat. It's not only the fountain of
light, but the source of all heat that's upon the face of
the earth. And so it is with Christ. Our
hearts, oh, how cold, how frozen they often are. faith and hope
and love. Somehow, I know it's here. I know it's here. But it's as
though it were frozen in a huge block of ice. And try all I may, I can't melt
the ice. try all I may, I can't melt the
ice. And I remain frozen. And thank
God, the Lord Jesus doesn't wait for some spark in me before he
shines in my soul. But when he shines, like the
springtime, Earl came up the steps this morning, he said,
I believe spring's here. You drive up the jungles yesterday,
Shabba said, or drive away, Shabba said, the jungles are in bloom.
The spring comes and the flowers begin to bloom and the trees
bud forth with life. And so it is that the Lord Jesus
shines in our hearts and melts the ice away. And suddenly, at
least while the sun shines, we can pray a little in the spirit,
and preach sometimes a little in the spirit, and hear sometimes
a little in the spirit, and meditate sometimes a little in the spirit,
and worship sometimes a little in the spirit. The sun is in
some ways the source of life. Nothing could live without it.
Nothing. Nothing could survive without
the shining of the sun. God in his wondrous creation
has set the earth and the sun in exact proximity to one another,
just exactly as we need. And when the sun rises, oh, how
things change. particularly here in the springtime,
I alluded to a moment ago, all winter long, everything seems
dead. It's not really. It's not really.
The trees out there are still alive. They've still got life
in them, but the life is drained to the roots. The flowers, the
bulbs still have life in them in the ground, but the life is
beyond the sight of our eyes. because the earth is frozen hard. But when the sun in the springtime
rises to its heights, then everything blooms with life. Our long wintry nights suddenly are dispersed when the
sun rises and the Lord Jesus comes Faith and hope and love
bloom with fresh life from him. The sun causes fruitfulness. We're talking today about planting
the garden, time to get peas in the ground, time to get onions
in the ground, time to get a little broccoli in the ground. And get
them in the ground now and just a little while, they'll start
multiplying fruit produced from that sown in the ground with
the brilliance and the warmth and the shining of the sun. And
this is what our Lord says to you who are his. From me is thy
fruit found. It is Christ who makes his church
a fruitful garden. You try to produce something. And you bring forth thorns and
briars and weeds. Nothing else. Just corruption
and curse. But Christ arises in the soul. And he brings forth faith, and
hope, and love, and joy, and peace, and long-suffering, and
gentleness, and goodness, and meekness, these things which
is his fruit. And he says, without me, you
can do nothing, nothing. Now, here's the second thing.
I've got to hurry, but I want to give you these next four things.
You'll find them delightful as I have, I believe. Unto you that fear my name shall
the son of righteousness arise with healing in his wings. When the son of righteousness
arises, he sheds beams of righteousness. He shines forth beams of righteousness
into your soul. He shows us in his light what
righteousness is. The righteousness of God. Not
the righteous character of God as God. That he gives by nature. That's stamped on your conscience
by nature. Romans 1 says so. He's talking about the righteousness
of God which he established. He does it by what's called Holy
Spirit conviction. He sends forth his Spirit and
convinces you of sin. and of righteousness and of judgment. Of sin, because you believe not
on me. Of righteousness, because I go
to my father. Of judgment, because the prince
of this world is judged. So that the son of righteousness
arises and shines forth brilliantly and convinces sinners of righteousness. His righteousness. He shows us
righteousness and gives us righteousness. righteousness which he earned
for us and is imparted to us or imputed to us in free justification
and righteousness which he is. Righteousness imparted to us
in regeneration, giving us a nature of righteousness so that now
we stand before God in him, righteous, holy, accepted in the beloved,
unblameable, unapprovable, and perfect in his sights. Not only
that, but when he shines forth, the son of righteousness arises
with healing in his wings. The scriptures often speak of
us taking shelter as birds under the wings of the mother. The
Lord Jesus arises with healing in his wings, taking shelter
under him. We find healing. All healing. All healing. He is the great
healer, the great physician. He demonstrated it while he was
on this earth, healing the diseases of men's bodies, even healing
death, healing the breaches that stood and existed, dividing men
from men. All temporal healing is his. The Lord will strengthen him,
the psalmist said, upon his bed of languishing. This is Psalm
41, verse three, you can look at it later. I was studying this
one morning early. I'd been sick for a long time.
And I came to these words, thou will make all his bed in his
sickness. And I spent a little time looking
at it. I forgot who it was suggested. I think it was Spurgeon. He said,
The word is the Lord will strengthen you in your weakness, in your
sickness, and he will make your bed in your sickness. That is
like a nurse comes in and turns the sick man on his bed who can't
turn himself. Now, when the nurses do that
for me, they got their hands full, but I've had it many occasion
to happen. Nurse come in and roll me. and turn me on my bed, I would
wonder sometimes, what are you waking me up for? Why are you
doing this? At first, I would have the nurse explain to me,
if you don't do this, you're going to get sores. You're going
to get sores. That's the word. The Lord comes in the midst of
the adversity and the trial and the sickness and the heartache,
and like a tender, caring nurse, He makes your bed comfortable,
turns you on the bed and makes you comfortable in it. All spiritual
healing is his. He comes and heals us of our
sins with free pardon, complete forgiveness. And when he's done,
there's going to be some everlasting healing. Turn to this passage,
Revelation chapter 21. Revelation 21. Verse 4. I haven't preached from this in
a while, maybe I will soon. God shall wipe away all tears. Isn't that wonderful? All tears. All of them. Never have a sorrow. Never a regret. Never wish it'd been different.
God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. And there shall
be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying. Neither shall there
be any pain. No more pain, any kind. No pain from any source, no pain
of any kind, no pain because of anything, no pain from anybody,
no pain. How can this be? For the former
things are passed away. All right, next we read You shall
go forth and grow up as calves of the stall. This is interesting. You shall go forth as calves
of the stall. Those words are talking about
freedom. When Christ comes to the center in saving grace, all
is freedom. Bondage is over. Loosen and let
him go. That Gadarene, they thought they'd
chain him up and bind him. And that's what religion does.
And the Lord Jesus set him free, set him free. This is what he's
talking about. The word stall here, the word
that's translated stall, comes from a root word that means tied
up or yoked. And when the son of righteousness
arises in your soul, He breaks the yoke of bondage. Sins bondage, legal bondage,
religious bondage, tradition bondage, social bondage. He breaks
the yoke of bondage. You see, the thing that folks don't seem to
get at all, without Christ, everything's bondage. Everything. I see these
basketball players on television right now. All of them got tattoos
all over their bodies. I mean, they look like, you don't need me to tell you
what they look like. Got tattoos all over them. So stupid. Just stupid. Fellas, you know,
what's that song that fellas got through a pop of pants on
the ground, everybody running around with their britches hanging down below the
rear end? Oh, I'm free. I'm expressing my freedom. Yeah. I wonder how come everybody else
doing the same thing? No, for everybody's in bondage. Act like
a fool because everybody does behave as you do, because everybody
does follow everybody in bondage to the pressures of warning man's
approval and bondage to your own lust. But Christ comes. and the sun shines in your soul
and brings healing. And like the young calf filled suddenly with fresh life,
the yoke is broken, the stall walls are broken down, and he
goes free. Not only that, the word grow
up The word translated grow up is interesting. He said you shall
grow up like a calf of the stall. The word means to leap around. Leap around. Frolic. Become frisky. Leap around the
field. That's the idea. When Christ
comes, the son of righteousness, shining with life and light upon
your soul, shining with beams of righteousness into your heart,
with healing beneath his wings. When he comes and sets you free,
he causes you to leap with joy. Rejoice and leap with joy, therefore,
for the Son has made you free. Amen.