Prophecy and Promise: Devotions from Time of GraceSample

The Day Will Burn Did you believe in Santa Claus when you were a kid? I imagine most people did. Santa stories can be imaginative fun for little children. That is, unless people actually start to believe the "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" malarkey. It's bad enough if children believe that their gifts really came from a fat guy in a red suit. What is far worse is if this seemingly omnipotent and all-seeing North Pole-dweller becomes people's pattern for how God operates. After all the hype and threats and bluster, even naughty boys get nice presents, not coal, in their stocking. I fear that many reasonably intelligent people also suspect that God can see everything, but that there will be no consequences. Just as Santa claims to see who's been naughty or nice but then gives presents to everybody anyway, they think God will ignore our naughtiness and everybody will get some pie by and by. Wrong. God's righteous judgment over sin will slam into the planet. The prophet Malachi said, "'Surely the day is coming; it will burn like a furnace. All the arrogant and every evildoer will be stubble, and that day that is coming will set them on fire,' says the LORD Almighty" (Malachi 4:1). It is a healthy and sane response to tremble before the righteous anger of a holy God. A day of wrath is coming. Now you know.