Joel is lumped into what we call the minor prophets. They are called minor because they are shorter in their content, not in their message. This Book is full of truth and we can learn much from it.
Let's start by reading Joel 1:1-20;
The word of the Lord that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel:2 aHear this, byou elders;give ear, ball inhabitants of the land!cHas such a thing happened in your days, or in the days of your fathers?3 dTell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children to another generation.4 What ethe cutting locust left, fthe swarming locust has eaten.What the swarming locust left,gthe hopping locust has eaten, and what the hopping locust left,hthe destroying locust has eaten.
for it is cut off from your mouth.6 For ka nation has come up against my land,kpowerful and beyond number;lits teeth are lions' teeth, and it has the fangs of a lioness.7 It has laid waste my vine and splintered my mfig tree; it has stripped off their bark and thrown it down; their branches are made white.8 Lament like a virgin1 nwearing sackclothfor the bridegroom of her youth. 9 oThe grain offering and the drink offering are cut off from the house of the Lord.pThe priests mourn,pthe ministers of the Lord.10 The fields are destroyed,qthe ground mourns, because rthe grain is destroyed,rthe wine dries up, the oil languishes.11 sBe ashamed,2 O tillers of the soil; wail, O vinedressers, for the wheat and the barley,tbecause the harvest of the field has perished.12 The vine dries up;uthe fig tree languishes. Pomegranate, palm, and apple, all the trees of the field are dried up,
and vgladness dries up from the children of man. 13 wPut on sackcloth and lament, pO priests; xwail, O ministers of the altar. Go in, wpass the night in sackcloth, pO ministers of my God!yBecause grain offering and drink offering are withheld from the house of your God. 14 zConsecrate a fast; zcall a solemn assembly. Gather athe elders and aall the inhabitants of the land to the house of the Lord your God, and cry out to the Lord. 15 Alas for the day! bFor the day of the Lord is near, and as destruction from the Almighty3 it comes. 16 Is not the food cut off before our eyes, cjoy and gladness from the house of our God? 17 dThe seed shrivels under the clods;4 the storehouses are desolate; the granaries are torn down because ethe grain has dried up. 18 How fthe beasts groan! The herds of cattle are perplexed because there is no pasture for them; even the flocks of sheep suffer.5 19 To you, gO Lord, I call. hFor fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness, hand flame has burned all the trees of the field. 20 Even the beasts of the field ipant for you because the water brooks are dried up, hand fire has devoured the pastures of the wilderness.
The Word of the Lord came to Joel,
son of Pethvel. We don’t know much about
Joel, except his name means “Jehovah is God”.
There are other men in the Bible named Joel, but most likely none of
them are the Prophet Joel. Not knowing much about Joel is on purpose. I think
that this reflects many of the prophets who lived out their message. Like Ezekiel, Isaiah, and even Hosea, the
message is a message from God. The Book
of Joel is about the message, not the man.
There is nothing about the man that could distract us from the
message. I do love the poetry in this
book, and the parallels.
We also do not
know when this Book was written. There
are scholars that will try and date this book, but these are all just
guesses. I will not try and date it,
because as we will discover, the date is not important. John Calvin said it
best, “As there is no certainty, it is better to leave the time in which he
taught undecided; as we shall see, this is of no great importance”. What is important
is that Joel had witnessed a devastating invasion of Israel by locusts.
Joel also knew that this was an act of God Himself. It was not by mere chance,
as revealed in verses 2-4.
Here we see,
that utter devastation had come to the land of Israel. The details that Joel gives are truly
remarkable.The first swarm is most likely the
adult locusts that moved in because of the drought conditions. This dry land would have been perfect for the
females to lay their eggs. Once they hatched, the young locusts would hop
around and eat any vegetation in sight. They could cover four to six hundred
feet per day, eating everything they could reach. Once they molted and became adults, they
would fly up and eat what ever was left. The locusts left nothing! Consuming any plant in sight, even the trees;
they would eat clear through to the bark, sometimes snapping limbs in
half. This was certain disaster for
Israel.
How does Joel
handle this situation? How do we handle
natural disasters today? For one thing,
if we only consider it natural, the disaster would start on its own and stop on
its own. Some might take a disaster
like this more lightly, being a natural occurrence. Some might try and put on their good
Christian smile and just keep telling everyone that all is good, not a big
deal, just be happy. That is clearly not
what Joel did! He took this disaster
very serious. Yet, others might proclaim
that this is the end of the world “I have been telling you this was
coming! It is the end of the world! I
have been warning you!” These are the
gloom and doom people who are always looking for the worst in every
situation. Joel was neither of
these. He simply told it like it was,
and it was bad!
In verse 2 Joel even asks the elders, “has anything like
this had happened before?” This is
clearly a rhetorical question. Joel
knows nothing like this had happened before. Now let us look at the people Joel was addressing:
a.) The elders, they would know the history and could
start telling the people. Especially the young people, we should be teaching
them. Tell them, so that they will
remember and tell the next generation.
These elders will be leading the people through this time of disaster. You will be leading the people, so be prepared. Joel goes to them first.
b.) The drunkards; it is interesting
that this is the next group speaks to. The drunkards here will be
affected by this disaster. There will be
no more wine until the next season. I love how Joel says “awake” because he is
telling them, “hey, wake
up!” We can all be like drunkards
sometimes, wondering around in life with little care of
what is going on. Joel is saying wake up; wake up from your drunken
stupor! Don’t let yourself drift in off into a joyless state of misery. Do not live your life as if there is no care in the world, which is the way
drunkards live pretending there is no God.
Joel says, “Wake up and
weep!”
This is how the Lord works,
He uses disasters to take away our pleasures in life specifically Christians who get their pleasure from
something other than the Lord. When we
are being self-centered, instead of God
centered, Joel is saying wake up weep,
wail and cry out because this is bad! I love the poetry and analysis to show the depth and destruction the locusts have caused.
In verses 6-7
we have figures of speech describing the destruction of the locusts. The Lord is also saying, all these are mine. Notice the words My land, My vine, My fig
tree, it is all the Lords and He can do with it what
He pleases. Next we see the Lord calling
His people to repent.
In verse 8 the drunkards are called to lament, that is to mourn lake a bride
who is just married and about to start the honeymoon and all of a sudden her
husband is dead. That is the kind of
mourning Joel is talking about. All of
the bride's hopes and dreams are destroyed. They went from the happiness of joy into the pain of hurt.
Does our sin
crush us, do we hurt?
In verses 9-10 we see no more offerings, the priests mourn, the
fields are destroyed the ground mourns. Sin has brought deep sorrow to the whole universe, even the ground
mourns.
Paul even hits on this point in:
Romans 8: 19-21 "For the creation
waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation
was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it,
in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to
corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God."
(Even creation waits to be restored through Christ, and the work done on
the cross.)
c.) The farmers (v.11-12), they
would be the most affected by this disaster.
This group would have worked so hard, put in so much time and energy into
making crops, all for nothing. No crops, not anything! Joel continues to
describe how nothing will escape this disaster.
Look at verse 12 again, the vine, the fig tree the pomegranate, the palm
and apple trees all affected. I love the
way Joel closes this verse, “gladness dries up from the children of man”. It reminds me of Adam and Eve in the garden,
man in his innocence was able to fully enjoy God and His creation. But sin ruined that, man was kicked out of
the garden and now we work the ground and sin has affected everything, even our
joy and gladness. If only God's Spirit would be poured out once more, if only
the Spirit that hovered over the waters at creation would come and show this
life giving power! Then joy would
return.
d.) The priests and ministers are next to be spoken to
(v.13-14) and given solemn commands.
These men were supposed to lead the people. We see what they are to do themselves, and
how they must lead the people during this time.
First, when judgment falls on God's people, the ministers must be the
ones to take the lead and mourn before the Lord. Second, they must lead the people in doing
the same.
Today, we must see this disaster the way
Joel saw it, as a judgment on God's people and a time to mourn over our sin and
repent. Often we look around at other
people going through a disaster, and wonder what they did to deserve that. It is tempting to pass judgment on others,
when in fact; we should be looking at ourselves, wondering why disaster has not fallen on us. Examine our own hearts.
Next Joel tells the people and us
that this disaster should remind us of the great disaster that is to come. The Lord's judgment is final. (v.15-18) The Lord will return. We will look at this more in Chapter 2. Disasters and calamities should remind us all
that one day Christ will usher in the great and terrible Day of the Lord. Are you prepared for that day? Also, it should lead us into self-examination
and repentance, what we have been talking about. As Christians, this should not bring fear to
us but instead, hope and joy.
Hebrews 12:6 “For the Lord disciplines the one He loves
and chastens every son whom He receives.”
This should bring us hope that the
Lord is drawing us near to Him; the Lord uses these things to wake us up out of
our stupor and draws us close to Himself. Praise God He is working in our lives. Don't be in love with the things of this world. God says “look to Me, I control this
world. I am God alone; joy and gladness
come through Me.” If we put our joy and
gladness in the things of this world and God takes them away, what is left? Trust in Him, have faith. A relationship with the Most High God alone
brings joy and affirmation in times of trial.
Joel closes with
a prayer, (v.19-20) showing that he is not merely a man on the outside looking
in. But he is also partaking in this
judgment and will actually do what he is calling the others to do. He cries out to God. The Holy Spirit leads us to true and real
repentance, not just the appearance of it, and a repentance that changes your
life. All this can only come through the accomplished work of Christ on the cross and His resurrection.
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