Who Can Endure The Day When He Comes? The One Who Sees Himself As He Is, And The One Who Sees The Lord As He Is.

The same rings true with cleaning clothes. They didn’t have front loading washing machines back in the day. So I’d imagine you’d have to scrub your clothes with soap by hand and rub out the dirt on a rock or a stone with some elbow grease. The literal word used for soap is lye. It’s similar to bleach, but it has a different chemical base. It is very powerful, so that it could actually burn your skin if you were exposed to it too long. In the right conditions, lye can cause a dead body to decompose, so Mexican cartels use it on the bodies of those they kill. When cleaning clothing, you’d have to be careful so as not to destroy the material while cleaning the cloth. So again, this is how God pictures us, as the dirty clothing that He is coming to scrub on and clean with this powerful substance that can kill. But if you want to be clean, He’s got to come and do His work.

If the silver and the clothing were alive, the natural response would be to run from the refiner and the launderer. I don’t want to go anywhere near Him. It’s too painful. I’m happy to be who I am. But then He shows us the end product. The before and after pictures. Being pure and holy is a beautiful thing. No more shame. No more guilt. No more imperfections. How can this be? I’m too dirty. Luther put it beautifully -

Christ is not merely the Purifier but also the purifying Agent. He is not only the Blacksmith but also the Fire; not only the Cleaner but also the Soap. He does not sit indolently at the right hand of His Father. Rather He is always working among us vitally, effectively, and uninterruptedly as He is spread abroad over His mystical body, as fire is applied to metal. So He is elsewhere called Salvation, and not just Savior. That is, He is Salvation itself and the Laboratory of salvation.

Luther, M. (1999). Luther’s works, vol. 18: Minor Prophets I: Hosea-Malachi. (J. J. Pelikan, H. C. Oswald, & H. T. Lehmann, Eds.) (Vol. 18, pp. 410–411). Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House.

Jesus is a Refiner and a Launderer who doesn’t want to destroy us. He wants to miraculously cleanse us and purify us. Malachi draws this beautiful picture of God. He says,

Certainly I, the LORD, do not change. That is why you, sons of Jacob, have not come to an end. 7 Since the days of your fathers, you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of Armies.

“I’m still the same God,” He was saying. I haven’t changed. Not only does He condemn, but He also SAVES. He saved the Israelites from Egypt and also from Babylon, because of who HE is. Think of how He described Himself to Moses in Exodus 34, “The LORD, the LORD, the COMPASSIONATE and GRACIOUS God, slow to anger, ABOUNDING in love.” And isn’t it interesting to think of HOW He saved us? He would prove His CHANGELESSNESS, by, in a sense CHANGING HIMSELF, and taking on FLESH. He would become soft and weak, a little baby. Think of the Christmas hymn, “Where Shepherds Lately Knelt.” It’s so beautiful and simple -