The Great and Awesome Day of the Lord

I am thinking of a day in the future that will be a most unpleasant day. I am thinking of the day down the road that will be difficult to endure. Biblical writers refer to this day as the day of the Lord. It is judgment day. Israel experienced this day. Lost people throughout the ages have faced this day after death. It is a horrific day that defies description. Such a day awaits others who choose to resist and reject the Lord.

[Joel 2:11] refers to this day as a great and awesome day. The word "great" means it will be a long, mighty and loud day when God pours out vengeance and anger on those who have rejected him and his ways. Do not miss this truth. God does get angry over sin and he deals with it in a severe manner. When that day comes it will be the longest day for sinners. They will long and wish for the day to end but there will be no relief. It will be a mighty fierce day and a day filled with weeping and gnashing of teeth. The torment and anguish will never relent. The Bible tells us God is slow to anger. [Joel 2:13] He does get angry. Slow to anger means long suffering and patient with people. God gives people the chance to repent. He sends his messengers like he did with the prophet Joel to Israel. He has sent messengers in our day. Many choose not to hear. They turn deaf ears to preachers and other messengers from God who warn of a great and awesome day of the Lord.

While we continue life as normal the waters of God's judgment build into a tumultuous fury behind the safety dam of God's grace and compassion. While God hold himself back the anger and fury over sin and the rejection of his laws escalates. The day will come when wrath will overflow the dam of grace. The great and terrible day of the Lord will result in God's justice demanding payment for sin. This will come either through the sacrifice of his son Jesus who justifies to sinners to God the Father or it will come through eternal punishment. One way or the other sin will be dealt with. There will be a day of reckoning.

Even as I write this America, Texas, and Paradise are storing up wrath for themselves. We would be wise to consider it is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance. [Rom 2:4-5] History has shown over and over again when God had enough there was a great day of the Lord. History has also shown when the people of God repented and cried out for mercy God had compassion and forgave.

The great and awesome day of the Lord does not have the same connotation our society gives the word awesome. In this passage "awesome" means terrible, frightening, dreadful and fearful. Nobody will want to see that day. Judgment day is a day like no other. There are no words to describe the anguish and fierceness of it. There is no way that day can be described. More terrible than the imagination can conceive. More frightening than your worst fears realized but with no ending point. More dreadful than the worst experience of your life repeated over and over again for all of eternity.

There is still hope. There is still time to turn to the Lord. There is still time to repent and turn from sin and to the Lord. Yet, with repentance there is the hope for grace, compassion, and lovingkindness. With repentance and mourning over sin there is hope that God will forgive and restore and hold back his wrath and fury. O sinner, how long will you reject the love and forgiveness of God. Do not wait any longer. Your very life hangs in the balance between heaven and hell by a thread. Your life is suspended by a small thread over the volcanic molten lava of God's judgment. To spurn his love and grace is sealing your soul to impending doom and torture forever. Turn to Jesus for salvation and forgiveness. Rest in the rescue boat of his forgiveness and sail the tranquil waters of his compassion and mercy.

Paradise. Open wide your eyes and look around you. Blow the trumpet in Zion and cry out for God to draw his people back. Preachers weep between the porch and the altar. Plead for God to revive the city. Do not delay. The hour is late and who knows if we repent and return to the Lord if he will not come again and heal our land. None of us want to see the great and terrible day of the Lord. May we return to the Lord before it is too late for some. Eternity hangs in the balance.