The Sun Shall Rise

A Reflection on the First Reading for November 17th, 2019:
Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Malachi 4.1-2

“See, the day is coming, burning like an oven,
when all the arrogant and all evildoers will be stubble;
the day that comes shall burn them up,” says the Lord of hosts,
“so that it will leave them neither root nor branch.

“But for you who revere my name
the sun of righteousness shall rise,
with healing in its wings.”

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Before I was a Christian, I remember thinking: “I’m a good person; I don’t mean anyone any harm, and I just want to mind my own business and live a good life. I don’t need or want to be accountable to some god who might be angry with me if I don’t do everything right.”


I didn’t really believe in heaven or hell or any of that. I let my own judgement rule. And my life was okay. I guess I just thought that was all there was, and so I trusted myself to know where the boundaries were; to be able to make decisions and determine my own behaviour. After all, I was a well-brought up, well-educated, sensible, and responsible person. I had my flaws, but so does everyone, and mine were not worse than anyone else’s. It was in this justification of my own failings relative to the failings of others that was the middle ground I travelled for quite a long time.


In time, I began to realize that this middle ground felt somewhat lacking. I had fallen down, hard, in my relationships, confronted by my selfishness, and I knew something had to change. But how? I discovered that I couldn’t do it under my own power, with my own agenda, and my own “good” judgement. I became painfully and frightfully aware that life as I knew it had every potential to fall apart, if it was only based on me. And not only that, I knew that I didn’t want a mediocre life that was just held together by a thread of my own strength to deal with my own faults and the faults of others. That was no way to live.


I remember my first encounter with what Jesus did; the amazement I felt with the realization that He willingly and gracefully endured vicious torture and humiliation, because He knew what it was for. I had never before been witness to this kind of selflessness, on so many levels, and it drew me in. The idea that there was a God who loved me like that was almost too much to take in. That was when I realized that there is something to this Christian story. Over time, it was this, combined with breathtakingly personal experiences of God’s love, that cemented my understanding that God is not an angry, vengeful God, but that His very nature is love and mercy itself.


God’s intention is that we be motivated by love. I have experienced that God loves me, and I have therefore come to desire not to disappoint Him or to break His heart. This does (and should) motivate me more than fear of punishment. Acting out of this Love has never led me astray, and as Malachi prophesied, as I revere His name, the beautiful and life-giving sun of righteousness—right relationship with God—has risen over my life, with tremendous healing in its wings. ​


​Lindsay Elford

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