Joel: Waiting Well For the Day of the Lord

Introduction

Illustration: Tsunami: Many years ago, a tsunami hit the coast of Thailand that took the lives of thousands upon thousands of people. In the wake of tsunami, article were written about a certain phenomenon that takes place during tsunamis. Before the surge hits land and causes destruction, the tide is pulled back a hundred yards or so from the beach. The coastal water is sucked out away from the beach. The phenomenon is that for those who have proper awareness, they know what to do. Run to higher ground. Seek safety. But for many tourists, or those who have never seen or heard this, often they begin turn the warning sign into a reason to linger and take photographs, and walk out further. In the history of tsunamis, many have died for this reason.

Personal: Today, our theme, as we study the book of Joel in the Old Testament, is the Day of the Lord. Sometimes referred to as the 'Day of the Lord's Wrath' or the 'Day of the Lord's vengeance.' This day is coming as certain as you or I are sitting here right now. The tide has been pulled back. The question we have to answer today, is whether we will be those who sit and play as that day approaches, or whether we will be those who take refuge.

Context: We are continuing our summer sermon series through the 12 minor prophets. Last week we looked Hosea. Today we look at Joel. Joel is only three chapters long but has a lot to tell us. Joel’s great contribution to the entire Bible is his treatment of the “Day of the Lord.” While many prophets speak about the great and terrible Day of the Lord, Joel provides the most sustained treatment of it. It appears as early as verse 15 when he says,

Joel 1:15 “Alas for the day! For the day of the Lord is near, and as destruction from the Almighty it comes.”

And so today, this sermon has two parts. First, we want to understand what the ‘Day of the Lord’ is. Then second, we want to understand, how we are to live properly in light of the fast approaching day of the Lord.

Meaning & Application

I THE NATURE OF THE DAY OF THE LORD

So let us begin by considering how Joel describes the nature of the “Day of the Lord.”

Plague of Locusts: As this book begins, the prophet looks backwards at Israel’s recent history and recalls that they had just experienced an incredible plague of locusts that had ravaged the countryside. Quite literally the plague had eaten much of the crops, and there was a famine throughout Israel.

Joel 1:3–4 “Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children to another generation. What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten. What the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten, and what the hopping locust left, the destroying locust has eaten.”

We ourselves in Chicagoland are experiencing a season of cicadas. If you have made your way out to the suburbs in the last few weeks you may have seen the thousands of bugs crawling on the trees and plants. Our cicadas are nothing compared to a plague of locusts in the Middle East and Mediterranean.

Deadly Famine: These bugs were not just a nuicance, for many they were a death sentence. Because they ate all the grain, there was no food in Israel. If you ran out of grain you couldn’t run to a supermarket and buy a loaf bread. So in Joel 1:10-11 we read.

Joel 1:10–11 “The fields are destroyed, the ground mourns, because the grain is destroyed, the wine dries up, the oil languishes. Be ashamed, O tillers of the soil; wail, O vinedressers, for the wheat and the barley, because the harvest of the field has perished.”

You might say, “What in the world does a swarm of locusts have to do with the Day of the Lord.” As it turns out, everything! Throughout the Bible, the term “the Day of the Lord” is used in two different ways that overlap.

Localized Temporary Events: Sometimes, it describes localized temporary events that were extraordinarily destructive. We see this in our text today, where Joel 1:15 is referring to the plague of locusts as “the day of the Lord.” Elsewhere in Scripture, we see that the “day of the Lord” is used to describe terrible days of battle where many died and where cities were destroyed. So for example, when Assyria attacked Israel and conquered them, Isaiah refers to that as “the Day of the Lord.” Often, when judgment on a nation from God as a result of that nation’s sins, the Biblical writers referred to that day of destruction as “the Day of the Lord.”

Still?: Does God still do this? He certainly does. Without a prophetic voice explaining God’s actions, we must be very slow in forcing an interpretation when we see our own cultural events. But we must not forget ever, that God’s judgment is hard. A very clear example of this that I have used often is our own Civil War in this nation. I believe that war was an act of judgment on our nation, for failing end the slave trade as European Christians had been able to do a generation prior.

Wake Up Calls: Plagues, wars, in the Bible are referred to as lower case D ‘days of the Lord.’ And those moments of judgment are to function as wake-up calls, as sirens beeping in our ears, reminding us of the sovereign hand of God, of the consequences of sin, and calling us to repentance, as individuals and as a nation.

The Ultimate Day of the Lord: But the Day of the Lord does not only refer to local temporary events. Joel hints at this in chapter 2. He writes,

Joel 2:1–2 “Blow a trumpet in Zion; sound an alarm on my holy mountain! Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord is coming; it is near, a day of darkness and gloom, a day of clouds and thick darkness! Like blackness there is spread upon the mountains a great and powerful people; their like has never been before, nor will be again after them through the years of all generations.”

Here, the locusts are pointers towards the ultimate Day of the Lord that “is coming.” When Joel describe the darkness and gloom, quite literally plagues of locusts can be so dense that they can block out the sun. The clusters can be so thick coming over the mountains that it can look like an army coming over the mountains. While he is describing locusts, it is clear he is ultimately using them to point towards the final day of the Lord, when Christ returns to judge the living and the dead. This will be a day like none other in all of history.

Destruction & Terror: According to Isaiah it will be a “day of destruction.” In fact, in the New Testament it is often referred to as the “day of wrath.” This is why the locust plague pointed Israel towards the final day. This is the day when Christ returns and all of his enemies will be bound forever. The Bible describes that day with great violence. With great weeping. And with great terror. Isaiah chapter 2 describes this day in the folllowing way,

Isaiah 2:12-19, “For the Lord of hosts has a day against all that is proud and lofty, against all that is lifted up—and shall be brought low… And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled, and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low, and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day. And people shall enter the caves of the rocks and the holes of the ground, from before the terror of the Lord, and from the splendor of his majesty, when he rises to terrify the earth.”

When Christ was born, he came as an infant. He came to serve and to give his life as a ransom for me. When Christ returns, he will return as the King upon a white war-horse, with a sword in his hand, and the name King of Kings written upon his thigh. And when he comes, he will come to end all sin, to take his place physically on his throne, and to usher in a new age of heaven on earth.

Gospel: And yet, even in that day of terror, when God himself rips apart our reality in order to establish a new order, the Christian will say, “It is well with my soul,.” And we will be able to say that despite ourselves. When Christ comes to judge this Earth, we are those whom that judgment ought to befall. But if we are in Christ, then Christ has already gone underneath the judgment on our behalf. Our debt is already paid in full. There is no more judgment for those who are in Christ. None! Therefore, the Day of the Lord, though terrible for every other person alive, is a day of sweet homecoming for the Christian, when they finally meet Christ face to face.

II FIVE RESPONSES TO PROPERLY UNDERSTANDING THE DAY OF THE LORD

What I have done so far, is tried to paint a picture of the nature of the Day of the Lord as Joel treats it. Now, I want to move us to Joel 2:12-17, and we are going to work through this section bit by bit, and I want to draw out six applications for how we ought to live faithfully in light of the coming Day of the Lord.

A Live Your Faith with a Sense of Urgency: First, live your faith with a sense of urgency.

Joel 2:12–14 ““Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster. Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord your God?”

Joel begins this section with these beautiful words, “‘Yet even now,’ declares the Lord.” Yet even now! It is not too late. The door is not shut. You still have life and breath. Every day that we are alive, is but one more gift the Lord has sovereignly chosen to bestow upon you to provoke us to repentance, and to run to him.

Individually: Let me apply this in two ways. First to the individual. Your life may have any number of complications and difficulties. Some of these may have been brought on by your own sin, as was the case with Israel. The reason for the plague of locusts was for sin in the camp of Israel. Some of you may have such difficulties that you cannot imagine a way out, a way through. These words, “Yet even now” speak to you. At the center of the issues of our life, whether those issues come at us as a result of sin, or simply as a result of living in a fallen world, is an invitation to sit at the feet of Christ and let him minister to you. He is able to make sense of what looks to have no sense. He is able to comfort wounds in your life that you never imagined could be comforted. He is able to restore relationships that seem impossible to restore. “Yet even now” he may still do that.

Collectively: But this also speaks to us collectively, as citizens of a nation. Somewhere along the lines Christians stopped believing that God deals with nations. The Kingdom of God is not limited to a nation, in fact He is redeeming people from every nation as we speak. But that does not mean that God has stopped dealing with nations, or that we should not be praying for the health and strength of our nation. We are commanded to do so in Scripture.

1 Timothy 2:1–3 “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior,”

At the moment, it certainly seems that our nation is rampantly heading away from God and storing up future judgment from God. “Yet even now!” Do not give up on this city or this nation. Pray for its strength. Pray for revival. Pray for our leaders that God would grip their hearts, and that Christians would boldly lead the way forward. Who knows, maybe God will grant us yet a third major revival in our nation.

B Offer Christ Your Whole Heart, not Simply Your Religious Actions: Second, we must train ourselves to run to the Lord with our heart, and not simply with religion response.

Joel 2:12–13 “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.”

I love this language. God is after our hearts. He is not after an outward show of religion where we rip our garments, but in reality our hearts are nominally close to him. God sees through that charade. When we consider the great and awesome day of the Lord that is on our horizon, it ought to cause us to present our hearts fully to God. This is why simply attending Church is no clear sign of authentic salvation, nor of a healthy relationship. I am married to my wife of thirteen years. If all I did was come home every night and be in the same as the same home as her, that would be an unhealthy marriage. No, my wife gets my heart. We don’t just share a home, we share a life. Joel instructs us to bring three aspects of our heart in fulness to God.

Will (Fasting): First, our will. He calls us to fasting. Fasting is when we deny ourselves food in order to remind ourselves of our utter dependence on God for all things. This is a physical step of the will, where we altar the actions we would have taken, in order to draw near to God. Our will must be submitted to Christ. We cannot claim to bring God our hearts if aspects of our wills are outside of his good design.

Affections (Weeping): Second, is our affections. Joel calls us to weep. What are we to weep over, our sin. To weep over sin is to engage God with our affections. It is to let him stir our hearts to a degree that the presence of sin in our life causes an emotional response. Have you ever wept over sin in your life? We weep over many things. We weep over hardship in our life. We weep over tragedies in our communities. We weep over lost opportunities, broken relationships. But have you ever wept over your sin? Have you seen the filth of your own pride? And have you recognized that even the slightest of sins in our life is as if we ourselves were crucifying our savior? For a New Testament Christian, the deeper we understand our sin, the more glorious the gospel becomes. The clearer we see our rebellion to God, the clearer we see the fullness of what Christ has accomplished on the cross.

Mind (Mourning): Third, bringing our heart to God means submitting our mind to God. This is seen when Joel calls us to “mourn.” Mourning and weeping are similar, but mourning tends to describe a lamenting over loss. In the case of Joel’s audience, they were to mourn over the collective sins of Israel that had led to God’s judgment being so severe. Church, we must permit our mind to be reframed in order to see the world as God sees the world, and see the Church as God sees the Church.

Keller (Full Worship): Tim Keller used to explain full worship this way. He would say it si very possible to come to a worship gathering, and have your mind moved by the preacher, to go home and think “I really learned something today.” But if your affections are not stirred for Christ, it wasn’t worship. At the same time, it is very possible to be completely emotionally moved by a Sunday gathering, but if you are not drawn live differently in light of the experience, to apply your will, then it wasn’t full worship.

C Permit the Attributes of God to Regularly Minister to Your Soul: Third, in light of the fast approaching Day of the Lord, Christians ought to meditate deeply on God’s attributes.

Joel 2:13 ” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.”

Moses: This description of God did not develop with Joel. That is a phrase that Moses spoke to the people of Israel in the book of Exodus. After Moses received the 10 Commandments from God on Mount Sinai, he came down the mountain and he discovered rebellion in the camp. The people had made a golden calf and were worshipping an idol instead of the God who had just delivered them. O how quickly they had forgotten the Lord’s mercies. God brings upon them in that moment a terrible judgment that comes in the form of a plague on God’s people. Many died. Moses goes back up the mountain, and in Exodus 34:6-7 God proclaims truth about who He is. He says this to Moses,

Exodus 34:6–7 “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin…

That refrain, became for the people of God a memorized refrain passed down through the generations. It was a reminder that even when we are found in sin, our God is gracious. He is merciful. He is abounding in steadfast love.

Pierced By Love: I am reading a book right now on the topic of reading Scripture, and in the opening chapter he describes a scene in Scripture that is so compelling, of Mary—Christ’s mother—kneeling at the foot of the cross weeping as she looks up at her son being crucified. The title of the book is ‘pierced by love’ and the idea is that in that moment, she was experiencing viscerally her lvoe of Christ and Christ’s love of her. And that deep and profound experience of beholding Christ’s love for you, and responding wtih overwhelming love for Christ, is available to each of us every day. Being pierced by love, as Mary was, ought to be a regular habit of the Christian faith. We can dicsuss ways to foster that in your life, but one of them certainly is dwelling on God’s attributes. Sitting long enough to get a glimpse of his mercy.

Experiential: Church, reflection like this cannot be rushed. Is your relationship with God rushed? Do you take time to pause and turn off distractions, and sit at the foot of the cross? A rushed Christianity will bear very little fruit. Dwell and sit in the attributes of God.

D Prepare for Judgment Collectively, Not Just Individually: Fourth, the Day of the Lord requires a collective response, not simply an individualistic response. Look at verses 15-17,

Joel 2:15–17 “Blow the trumpet in Zion; consecrate a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Consecrate the congregation; assemble the elders; gather the children, even nursing infants…

Here, Joel calls all of Israel to a solemn assembly, to a national fast, a national day of prayer. Everybody is invited. The elders of the church, and the infants in the church. This really cuts against our American independent vein. We often want our Christianity to be only collective enough that it does not impede upon our own independence. This idea is not Biblical. A Church is committed and submitted to one another. That does not mean that each member does not live their own lives. But the life of the Church is a connected whole unto which we actively choose to participate, especially in movements of prayer.

Illustration - Graveyards: I’ve shared this before, but in the old days Church’s used to be built with graveyards on the property. And the reason for that was because they believed themselves to all be knit together in such a way, that they wanted to rise from the dead together. They so loved each other, that they looked forward to rising from the grave and seeing teh looks on each other’s faces in that moment. What a far cry from our individualistic Christianity.

Experiential: Let us test ourselves to see how individualistic our faith is.

Do your prayers contain the various activities of your church? (Men’s & Women’s Summer Ministry)? Why not? What is this revealing about the individualistic nature of your faith, if there is very little fervent prayer for the work of your Church?

Do you participate on Sunday mornings at our pre-service prayer? At that thirty minutes of prayer each week we call out to God to move mightily in our midst. To heal hearts, that His Word would go forward in strength and truth. What are the reasons we don’t participate in that time of prayer? Is it because we desire an extra 30 minutes of sleep? What is our lack of participation revealing about our hunger for “collective Christianity.”

This is simply revealing how individualistic we have become. “Call a solemn assembly.”

E Train Your Soul to Hunger for Ultimate Justice: Fifth… The Day of the Lord is a day of terror for those who are not in Christ. But for those who are in Christ, who are saved by the blood of the lamb, the Day of the Lord is a day of reckoning, where all that was made wrong in this world, will be set right. Joel demonstrates this beautifully.

Chart: Behind me I have a chart comparing the devastation that happens in chapter 1 side by side with the renewal that happens in chapter 2 verses 18-27.

The food that was eaten by the locusts in chapter 1 is restored in chapter 2.

Wine and the oil that was lost in chapter 1 is restored in chapter 2

The granaries that were destroyed in chatper 1 are restored in chapter 2

The land that was stripped bare in chapter receive rain in chapter 2

Trees that were destroyed in chapter 1 bear fruit in chapter 2

God of Justice: This section of Joel is a reminder that the Day of the Lord is a day of Justice. It is a day of God setting things right. That which was taken away due to sin and brokenness in this world, will be restored. O, how we ought to hunger for justice in this world. While next week in our study of Amos, we will look at justice more broadly, here we can consider it individualistically. There is coming a day when all will be set right, when every tear will be wiped away, when every hidden act of violence will be accounted for. For those of you that have had tremendous wrongs done against you, you can place your hope in that reality. God will set things right!

Closing

Joel 2:28–29 ““And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit.”

This verse is picked up in the New Testament as a description of what happened when the Holy Spirit came down upon mankind at Pentecost. In other words, we are living in the days of fulfilment of the book of Joel. Right now, you and I, are alive in the season of time that Joel longed to look into! What a moment! You, Christian, have been given the Holy Spirit, for such a time as this. As we move quickly towards that great and final day of the Lord, you have been assigned the unique gift, not only of being hidden in Christ, but even more of being filled by Christ and empowered with his love.

It is Well With My Soul: There is an old hymn we sing often in this Church titled ‘It is Well.’ It was written by a man who had just lost all four of his daughters as they were on a boat traveling across the Atlantic. And one verse in that hymn gets me every time.

And Lord, haste the day when the faith shall be sight, The clouds be rolled back as a scroll; The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend, Even so, it is well with my soul.

“Even so…” The Christian does not have a diminished view of God as if he is some weakling. We are well aware that the Day of the Lord stands on our periphery. With every day we inch closer towards its reality. If any of us are alive on that day, it will be a day like no other.