Prophet Elijah detailed in the Madonna and Child with Saints by Andrea di Bonaiuto

God makes our choices very clear in the Day of New Beginnings. He makes repentance possible. He empowers us to do what is right and righteous as the sun of righteousness shines upon our paths to light our way. Elijah has come to turn our hearts. Truth has come to reorient our thinking. Life has come to bring us hope. It is Advent. These are the days!

Malachi 3:16-4:6
New Revised Standard Version

Then those who revered the Lord spoke with one another. The Lord took note and listened, and a book of remembrance was written before him of those who revered the Lord and thought on his name. They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, my special possession on the day when I act, and I will spare them as parents spare their children who serve them. Then once more you shall see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him.

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. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. And you shall tread down the wicked, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet, on the day when I act, says the Lord of hosts.

Remember the teaching of my servant Moses, the statutes and ordinances that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel.

Lo, I will send you the prophet Elijah before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes. He will turn the hearts of parents to their children and the hearts of children to their parents, so that I will not come and strike the land with a curse.
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Malachi gives us plenty to chew on.

Here are some bites I am taking:

Sometimes it is confusing to sort the good from the evil. It is not really our job.

But God says there will come a day when it will be very obvious who serves God and who does not.

We might even be a little vague in our understanding of ourselves as we compartmentalize our lives. We think we are serving in this area, but not in another. We name some activity in our lives and designate it as something that honors the Lord.

But maybe it is more self-serving than we think.

We might dismiss some menial task we do as not worthy of God. Yet, it is this that pleases Him most.

We might be equally confused about people as a whole.

Stubble is what has no substance in our lives, Arrogance and evil burn away in the heat of God's righteous judgment. Nothing is left of them. Pray for that heat to come early in your life. You don't need the stubble.

The hotness of God's wrath will be manifest to His people differently. The sun of righteousness rises with healing in its wings.

We bounce like young calves with the joy of new life.

We tread down the wicked who oppress.

We win.

But first comes the prophetic word, the Elijah voice that calls us to repentance and restoration of broken relationships. It is time for hearts to be turned.
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Mark 9:9-13
New Revised Standard Version

As they were coming down the mountain, he ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead. So they kept the matter to themselves, questioning what this rising from the dead could mean.

Then they asked him, “Why do the scribes say that Elijah must come first?”

He said to them, “Elijah is indeed coming first to restore all things. How then is it written about the Son of Man, that he is to go through many sufferings and be treated with contempt? But I tell you that Elijah has come, and they did to him whatever they pleased, as it is written about him.”
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The disciples knew Malachi's words about Elijah coming before the Messianic Age could commence.

For them it was a barrier.

For Jesus, it was just a matter of fact. There is always an Elijah. In fact, he seems to be referring to John the Baptist as having most recently fulfilled that role.

There is nothing that keeps people from turning around, turning to God, turning to their parents, their children, their loved ones, their friends, their neighbors, and their enemies in love, forgiveness and restoration.

There is nothing that keeps God's people from doing righteousness.

There is nothing that keeps the wicked from turning from sin and oppression and deeds that make them stubble to a new life.

There is nothing that any of us need to wait for before we can answer the call of Jesus to stop doing as we please to the messengers of truth and start following the one to whom the message points.

The day and age of fulfillment has come and any hesitation we have is all on us.

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Now, let us sing. You can make up your own tune:

Psalm 125
New Revised Standard Version
A Song of Ascents.

Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion,
which cannot be moved, but abides forever.
As the mountains surround Jerusalem,
so the Lord surrounds his people,
from this time on and forevermore.
For the scepter of wickedness shall not rest
on the land allotted to the righteous,
so that the righteous might not stretch out
their hands to do wrong.
Do good, O Lord, to those who are good,
and to those who are upright in their hearts.
But those who turn aside to their own crooked ways
the Lord will lead away with evildoers.
Peace be upon Israel!