Day 365

Malachi 3:1–4:6; Revelation 22:1-21; Psalm 150:1-6; Proverbs 31:25-31

HAVE YOU EVER seen those television programs or news articles about people’s “famous last words”? For example, on his deathbed, John Quincy Adams said, “This is the last of earth. I am content,” while, apparently, the last thing Elvis said to anyone was, “I’m going to the bathroom to read.”

Last words and thoughts are fascinating because they give us brief hints of what a person considers most important at the end, or whether they are even aware their end is near.

Today, we’ve come to an end of our own. Three hundred and sixty-five days ago, we began a journey and made a commitment to read the whole Bible in a year, and we’ve done it.

Congratulations!

As we prepare to leave this year behind and embrace the next, let’s consider the last words of the Bible —and what it leaves us to consider. The final declaration of the Old Testament is this:

Look, I am sending you the prophet Elijah before the great and dreadful day of the LORD arrives. His preaching will turn the hearts of fathers to their children, and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise I will come and strike the land with a curse.

As we mentioned yesterday, it would take four hundred years for this final prophecy and final words of the Old Testament to be fulfilled. John the Baptist became that voice crying out in the wilderness and preparing the way for Jesus. This happened, as Malachi put it, “before the great and dreadful day of the LORD arrives.”

In Revelation, we find the final words of the New Testament and of the whole Bible:

He who is the faithful witness to all these things says, “Yes, I am coming soon!” Amen! Come, Lord Jesus! May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s holy people.

Here in Revelation, the “dreadful day of the LORD” is already in the past. All things have been made new. All is restored. Nothing is broken. There are no more good-byes. Our union with God is, once again, as it was always meant to be —perfect. To this, we all agree —come, Lord Jesus!