Message Info:
- Text: Joel 2:18-27, NASB
- Series: Joel (2024), No. 4
- Date: Sunday morning, September 22, 2024
- Venue: Central Baptist Church — Lawton, Oklahoma
- Audio File: Open/Download
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Transcript:
⟦Transcript⟧ When I was a kid, my grandmother made for me and each of my cousins an afghan. She used to crochet a lot before she had her stroke. And she made each of us these Afghans, and I don’t know how long she’d worked on them, but she gave them all to us for Christmas the same year.
And I still have that Afghan. As a matter of fact, it is folded up with the other extra blankets and pillows in our bedroom. But I have this Afghan, and several years ago I started noticing it just wasn’t keeping me as warm as it used to, I got to looking at it and realized there were holes in it.
Just in years of having it in storage and having it in closets, and critters had gotten into it, and there are critters that like to eat fabric. And I thought, well, I cannot throw this away. I don’t want to throw it away.
Something has got to fix what these things have gotten in here and eaten. And thankfully, at that time, my grandmother was still able to do some of the crochet work, and I sent it off to Nanny’s hospital, and she fixed it up, and I’ve got it again, and we try to keep it in a place where we know that the critters are not going to get to it. But sometimes the critters, and I keep using that word critters, first of all, because I’m an Oklahoman, second of all, because I don’t know exactly what kind of critters it was.
It might have been multiple kinds. But sometimes critters will get in there and eat things that have to be fixed. They need to be restored.
and that brings us to Joel chapter 2. We’ve been conducting this study through the book of Joel and you may have forgotten where we were because I’ve not been here to do this in the last two I’ve been here but two weeks ago I was sick and out of the pulpit and last week we had the presentation on our mission work through the Baptist Children’s Home and so we’re going to go back and pick up where we left off a few weeks ago and look at the book of Joel. And this is the first time in the book of Joel that we really get some positive news.
Up to this point, God has been giving them the bad news. And in their case, the critters were literal critters. They were locusts that were going to come and eat everything that supported life in the nation of Israel.
And once all of that eating was done, once all of that destruction had gone on, then it was going to be time for the work of restoration. And fortunately for Israel, as good as God was at sending the locusts to discipline them, God was also just as good at bringing restoration. And that’s what He promises.
He promises to them being able to restore what the locusts have eaten. and that’s an important promise for us to cling to in our relationships with God today that God is a God who is able to restore what the locusts have eaten it does not mean and we’ll get into this a little more later on it does not mean that we will always be on the receiving end of material prosperity it doesn’t mean that God is always gonna gonna bless us with money and stuff the way he did with Israel these were very specific promises he was making to a specific group of people But this passage tells us a lot about the nature of God and the will of God and the abilities of God to restore what the locusts have eaten. I’ve seen this happen in people’s lives today.
I remember a few years ago, a couple that I know were going through a circumstance where they were dealing with some of their children who had run away from God and had kind of turned their backs on their parents. And I remember several conversations with them about that and trusting God in that and continuing to love their children even when they were difficult. Okay, we’ve all been children who were difficult.
Many of us have had children who were difficult. As a parent, you’re still supposed to love them and talk to them about loving them anyway and continuing to pray for them. I remember once sending them a card with this verse about God restoring what the locusts have eaten.
And slowly over time, I’ve seen some of those relationships mended. Now, I had nothing to do with it. When I say I’ve seen it happen, I don’t mean to take any credit for that.
God has been the one restoring. Where it seemed like it was a hopeless situation, God was able to restore what the locusts have eaten. So I want us to look this morning at Joel chapter 2, the second part of Joel chapter 2, at what God says about his ability to restore.
And so we’re going to start this morning in verse 18, and if you would turn there with me and stand as we read together from God’s Word. If you don’t have your Bible this morning or can’t find Joel 18, that’s all right. It’ll be on the screen here for you as well.
Did I say Joel 18? Joel 2, 18. If your Bible has Joel 18, get a new one, because there’s not supposed to be that many.
Joel 2, starting in verse 18, and we’re going to go through verse 27 this morning. Then the Lord will be zealous for his land and will have pity on his people. The Lord will answer and say to his people, Behold, I am going to send you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied in full with them, and I will never again make you a reproach among the nations.
But I will remove the northern army from you, and I will drive it into a parched and desolate land, and its vanguard into the eastern sea, and its rear guard into the western sea, and its stench will arise, and its foul smell will come up, for it has done great things. Now, that might seem like an unpleasant description, but if God’s talking about the destruction of the army that’s been plaguing your country, that’s kind of a positive thing, that they’re going to be dead and piled up. He’s talking here about the locusts.
Do not fear, O land. Rejoice and be glad, for the Lord has done great things. Do not fear, beasts of the field.
For the pastures of the wilderness have turned green, for the tree has born its fruit, the fig tree and the vine have yielded and full. So rejoice, O sons of Zion, and be glad in the Lord your God, for He has given you the earthly rain for your vindication, and He has poured down for you the rain, the early and latter rain as before. The threshing floors will be full of grain, and the vats will overflow with the new wine and oil.
Then I will make up to you for the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the creeping locust, the stripping locust and the gnawing locust. My great army, which I sent among you, you will have plenty to eat and be satisfied and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. Then my people will never be put to shame. Thus you will know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God, and there is no other, and my people will never be put to shame.
And you may be seated. And we see again here in the book of Joel that as God begins to describe something through the prophet Joel, he goes into a lot of detail, almost to the point where we would never say this to God, but if we were listening to a person give this description, we might say, okay, I get it, you’re going to restore things. But the reason why he goes into so much detail and the reason why he goes into so much repetition is because he had told them in detail how bad the destruction was going to be.
And so as he’s warning them of the destruction that was going to come on the country as a time of discipline for their sins and a time of calling them back to repentance, it wouldn’t do to give such a graphic description of the destruction and then just say, but it’s all going to be fine. No, you want to go back and be just as detailed about how great it’s going to be on the other side of the repentance. And so he goes into all these these details, and God is speaking about these things as though they are already certain.
These things haven’t happened yet. As a matter of fact, it’s very likely that all of this message is being given at the same time. So God is sending the prophet Joel to warn them about the locusts that are coming, and before the locusts even get there, he’s describing the destruction that’s going to come, but also the restoration that’s going to come on the other side when they repent.
because God knew they were going to repent. God was not caught off guard. God was not surprised when they wandered away from Him.
God was not surprised when they were going to come back to Him because that was His goal. And so He’s already, even before the destruction comes, He’s already offering the promise of what’s next. And we see in this passage from the very beginning of what we looked at today that God cares for His people even in our struggles. And that is vitally important for us to recognize, because our feelings will lie to us every chance they get.
And you and I, even as believers, we will go through times of struggle, we will go through times of suffering, and our feelings may from time to time try to convince us that God doesn’t see, God doesn’t notice, God doesn’t care. Because our thought process goes something like this, God, if you really noticed, if you really loved me, if you really cared, if you really, whatever it is, I wouldn’t be in this situation. Listen, there are a lot of people in Scripture who were in dicey situations and were right where they needed to be in the center of God’s will.
The Scripture is clear that there is no greater love relationship than that between the Father and the Son. And the Son was right in the middle of the Father’s will when He came to earth. And look at the suffering that He went through.
We can’t look at that and say if God loved us, we wouldn’t ever suffer And so we need to understand that that God notices God sees God pays attention Even in our struggles because otherwise we’ll get into those times of struggle And our feelings and our intrusive thoughts will try to convince us That God doesn’t care or we wouldn’t be here to begin with What Joel is doing right here in verse 18 is reminding the people that God noticed their suffering And of course, we can look at this in hindsight and say, of course, God noticed their suffering. God is the one that sent the locusts, as we’ve already discussed. But don’t forget, God didn’t send the locusts to punish Israel first thing they stepped out of line, first time they stepped out of line.
God is incredibly patient. It never means that God is okay with our sin, but God is patient and compassionate toward us, and it takes a lot to push him to that point. It takes us not listening over and over and over as God is trying to call us back to him.
I had this conversation, or very similar conversation with one of my children just this morning at the breakfast table. Come sit down. Come sit down.
Come sit down. Come sit down. Come sit down!
I’m not a yeller. I don’t like to yell, but sometimes you have to. And that child looked at me and started to cry.
I said, no, no, no, you don’t get to ignore me four or five times and teach me that I have to go to that volume in order for you to hear me and then act upset like I’ve wronged you. Sit down. That happens.
That happens with God, too. When we don’t listen the first time, it gets a little louder, a little louder, a little louder. Finally, Israel had ignored God so many times that God sent in the locusts to eat up all their crops to get their attention.
So, yes, he sent them. Yes, he sent the locusts, but it wasn’t because he was mad at Israel. It wasn’t because he wanted Israel to be destroyed.
There was something worse on the other side if Israel kept going the route they were going, that they were going to be separated from God for all eternity. And sometimes God will use measures that look harsh to us to keep something worse from happening. Like if my kid steps out in the street, they could get hit by a car if I don’t teach them to stop doing that.
And so I may pull them back. Well, I’m going to pull them back. But I may pull them back and I may give them a little swat and they think that is the worst thing in the world.
And if it’s a reminder that something worse could happen, I need you to be aware of the danger of this situation. That’s what God was doing here with the locusts. And here they are about to be in the midst of all this suffering, one of the worst calamities that had ever fallen on their country.
They needed to know that God was still there and was still paying attention. As a matter of fact, he says in verse 18 that he will be zealous for his land. Zealous means that he was going to be passionate about it.
He was going to be protective of it. There’s an element where being zealous is a lot like being jealous, but in a good way. He was going to be zealous for his land.
He was going to be protective over the land of Israel, which may or may not be comforting to Israel when they look at everything that’s going on and they say, great, you’re protective over the land. What about us? But God was looking at the land and saying, I’m going to restore the land.
I fully intend to restore the land even better than it was before, not just because God was interested in the land itself. God created the earth out of nothing. God could create a whole new Israel if He wanted to.
It’s not that God needed the land. It’s not that God was excited about the patch of dirt there. It’s because God had set that land aside for the benefit of His people.
And when He had punished Israel, He had done so by devastating the land. Now He says, I’m going to restore the land. The land is not the point.
It’s God’s provision for His people. But God’s saying here, I noticed your suffering, even though you caused it. I’m paying attention.
and I’m going to restore what’s been lost. His zeal for the land was part of his commitment to his people. And Joel explains that God will have pity on his people. God was prepared to show them mercy despite their waywardness.
How compassionate is God that he would look at them while they were still in the act of sinning? I think the locusts have not even come at the point that this prophecy is being given. They were still in the act of sinning.
They were still wayward. they were still rejecting God, and God is already thinking several steps ahead about how He’s going to take care of them and about how He wants them to be restored into this relationship with Him. It’s incredible that He’s prepared to show them that kind of mercy.
It’s incredible that He prepares to show that kind of mercy to us. The book of Romans says that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. He didn’t even wait for us to get ourselves cleaned up.
Jesus came and paid for our sins while we didn’t deserve it, because we didn’t deserve it. The amazing compassion that God has. And it doesn’t even make a difference here that their suffering is because of stuff they’ve done.
I’m not going to ask for a show of hands because I think it would be pretty near unanimous that everyone in this room has suffered at some point. it’s probably pretty near unanimous that we would say we’ve suffered because of the actions of other people and it’s probably pretty near unanimous that we would say we’ve suffered because of our own bad choices I’ve suffered when I’ve done nothing wrong to cause it I’ve suffered because I’ve chosen to do dumb things I’ve suffered because I’ve chosen to do sinful things and God’s not looking at us in our suffering and saying, yeah, I’m not going to forgive that one. They were in the midst of a calamity that they caused.
Yes, God sent the locust, but it’s because for generations they had rejected Him, and it was the final straw. And yet, even looking at this predicament they had caused, God was prepared to show mercy. Even though their sin had led them to the point of discipline, God had chosen to show them that He cared, that He cared enough to notice, and that He cared enough to restore them.
That brings me to the second point this morning, that God is faithful to restore His people when they seek Him. Like I’ve said, this passage is given as the follow-up to the calls to repentance that we see at the end of chapter 1 and beginning of chapter 2. These are the promises of what God is going to do when the people repent.
And to be clear, and I’ve said this to you even again in this series, but I don’t think we can repeat it too much because there’s so much confusion over this word. repentance does not mean feeling bad about your sin, although that’s tied up with repentance. If we’re repentant, we’re going to feel bad about our sin.
Repentance doesn’t mean leaving your sin behind, although if we are repentant, that’s going to be tied up in that. All of these things are going to follow repentance, but what repentance actually is, is a change of mind and a change of heart. I’m not sure about the Hebrew, but in the Greek, that’s what it literally means, a change of heart and mind.
It’s the willingness to agree with God that my sin is wrong and that He’s right. Because when we’re unrepentant, we continue to embrace that sin. We don’t care what God wants.
We try to justify it. When we’re repentant, it doesn’t mean we’ll never sin again, unfortunately. but what it does mean is we are humble before the Lord, and we’re willing to acknowledge that what we’ve done is wrong.
And that’s what God is looking for from His people, that when we repent, God is ready and faithful to restore us when we seek Him. And if you remember from a few weeks ago back in verse 14, the prophet Joel says, Maybe, maybe the Lord will relent and even leave a blessing. There was that tiniest glimmer of hope for Israel back in verse 14, that maybe the Lord will change his mind.
Maybe the Lord will stop the locust. Maybe the Lord will restore. That tiny glimmer of hope in these verses turn into a promise here of what God actually will do. And he goes through this list of all the things he said he’s going to take away, and now he’s going to restore them.
Verse 19, he talks about the oil and the wine and the grain. Those are the main staples of life. Those were the things that they relied on to live, and he said he was going to restore those in abundance.
In verse 19, he talks about removing their shame. I will never again make you a reproach among the nations. Now, there are multiple ways that that can be translated here.
I will never again make you a reproach, or I will no longer make you a reproach, I think no longer actually fits better because there were times that God’s people were put to shame when after this, they wandered away from Him again. And then we see things like the Assyrian invasion, the Babylonian invasion. But what He’s telling them here is not a promise that you can do whatever you want and you’ll never be put to shame again.
What He’s saying is, if you’ll repent and you’ll turn to Me, I will take away your shame. I will take away the things that have made you a laughingstock of the pagan countries around you. He talks in verse 20 about how He will remove the curse from their land, this northern army.
He’s talking about the locusts and said He’s going to drive them out. And the locusts are going to be dead and piled up, and He says, for it has done great things. And this is a little bit of sarcasm here.
For the locusts have done great things. They had done something great in the sense of it was enormous. They had stripped the land of Israel completely clean of anything that would support life.
And yet God, with just His will, was going to say those things are gone and they’re dead and They’re piled up now. And he says in the following verses that God really has done great things. Verse 21, do not fear, O land, rejoice and be glad, for the Lord has done great things.
What he’s saying here is you think that this struggle, this calamity that you’ve gone through is enormous, and it is, but as great as that is, God is even greater. You want to see who’s really done great things? It’s not the locust, it’s God.
So he’s going to remove this curse from them. He calls for them to change their fear into rejoicing, not because their circumstances change, but because of his goodness. He calls them to rejoice and be glad in the Lord.
And yes, he’s going to take care of you. He’s going to fix what’s wrong. But ultimately, you just need to rejoice in him for being who he was.
And everyone was going to see his goodness. He talks about the beasts who had been crying out over their lack of food and water. And he says they’ll rejoice.
In verse 23, he talks about the people rejoicing. In verse 22, he talks about the pastures and trees being fertile again. He says in verse 23, he’s going to send the rain back.
He says in verse 24 that their supplies of everything they need are going to overflow. Now, once again, we need to be very careful when we’re interpreting Scripture, context is everything. We don’t want to just, you know, it’s kind of like real estate, location, location, location, the rules of interpreting the Bible, context, context, context.
It’s very easy to open up a verse, especially from the Old Testament, where it looks like a promise that God’s going to make everything prosper and say, well, that’s for me. Well, if you haven’t been devoured by locusts, it’s probably not for you, because he’s, I mean, it’s probably not to you. But we can still learn from it.
This was a promise to Israel that what God has taken away, God is going to restore. What their sin has taken away, God is going to restore. So we need to understand that this is not a promise to us that if we repent, God’s going to make us rich.
That would be a terrible motive for wanting to repent. I’m not sure we would be genuinely repentant at that point over our sins. What this is, is something that teaches us the character of God, that God wants to restore, that God looks at the harm that sin has done, and God wants to restore.
God wants to bring us back into fellowship with Him. God wants to create in us the spiritual growth that we’re supposed to have. and all that’s necessary really is for us to seek Him as His people, people that already belong to Him.
It shows us that God is able to restore. And both of these things are important because we look at our circumstances and we think nobody can fix this. God can fix it.
I don’t know your specific circumstance, but God can fix it. Now, our definition of fix and his may be different. There have been times I really thought God should fix this the way I wanted it fixed, and then God did something that I didn’t.
. . He did not fix it the way I wanted it fixed, but He fixed it, and what He did was better than what I wanted to begin with.
He’s really good at doing that. But again, in our struggles, we also look at it and say God doesn’t care. But we see here an example of God being willing to restore.
And our challenge in all of this is to trust God and rest in His promises. What a shame it would have been for Israel if they had created this problem by ignoring God, running from God, and then seeing the destruction that came on their country as a result, and if they had just given up and said, God doesn’t care, God can’t fix it, they would have never seen the restoration come. But the last three verses of this passage we looked at, He calls them to rest in Him.
He makes some promises to them. He says, I will make up for the years that these locusts have eaten. He said, you’ll have plenty to eat and be satisfied.
You’ll be taken care of. And you’ll praise the name of the Lord your God who has dealt wondrously with you. He said, you’ll look around and see the benefit, yes, to them materially, but also spiritually.
You’ll see the benefit of walking with me and me being your God and you being my people. You’ll see the benefit of this. You’ll see that I do everything I’ve promised and so much more, and you won’t be able to help but praise me because of how good I’ve been to you.
And he says in verse 27, and thus you will know that I’m in the midst of Israel. You’ll see by what I’ve done that I’m real, that I’m among you, and that I am the Lord your God, and there’s no other, and my people will not be put to shame. He’s promising them that the restoration that’s coming will be equal in magnitude to the consequence of their sins, if not greater.
He’s promising to be good to them and kind to them and compassionate to them. And as they were restored, they were going to know Him more deeply than they ever have before. They simply needed to know Him and trust Him and walk with Him.
And if you’re a believer this morning, if you’re somebody who’s trusted in Jesus as your Savior, the same God who reigned in the Old Testament is the same God who reigns today. That same God is there and willing to be known, eager to be known, eager for us to walk with Him, eager to show His goodness and His compassion to us. And one of the ways, one of the most important ways that we get to know Him more deeply is by walking with Him and resting with Him in times of struggle.
in times of trial. Yes, even if we’re there because we’ve made bad choices. Even if we’re there because we’ve sinned. Even if we’re there because we’ve done things we shouldn’t have done.
Even if we’re there because of no fault of our own. We learn to rely on Him in those times of struggle and trust Him for restoration. I’ve been a follower of Jesus now for over 30 years.
And there have been long periods of time of slow spiritual growth. I won’t say that there was none, but it’s just kind of slow and gradual when times are good. But when things get difficult, you know, we have a choice, and those difficult circumstances will either lead us to run to God or run away from God.
and if we can discipline ourselves as believers to walk with him and seek him and turn to him in the midst of our struggle and trust that he knows trust that he sees and notices and cares trust that he’s able to restore and just walk with him through that that’s where the the the periods of rapid spiritual growth happen that’s where you get to know god in a deeper way than you’ve ever known him before is experientially walking with him taking what you’ve learned about Him and putting it into practice when we trust that He’s there and He’s ready and eager and able to restore. And it doesn’t always come in our time. I’m sure that Israel would have liked for the whole locust situation to be over five minutes after it started.
I know I would, but God doesn’t always work in our time. But we trust Him and walk with Him and get to see that the restoration on the other side is greater than what we had to go through to get there. And especially this morning, if you’re somebody who’s never trusted Christ as your Savior, the most important restoration you need in your life today is the restoration of fellowship with God.
We were created to have a relationship with Him. We were created to walk with Him. And sin got in the way of that.
Sin is anything, and I steal this definition. I hope that’s not a sin, but I steal that definition from our kids’ camp. Sin is anything we think, say, do, or don’t do that displeases God.
my kids taught me that that sin got in the way of our relationship with God and it continues to push us further and further away from a holy God and you and I could never do anything to fix the relationship we could never do anything on our own to to make the relationship right we are just destined to get further and further away from God except for one thing that God in his compassion looked at us and in spite of us being in a mess of our own making, God took the steps necessary to restore us. And He sent Jesus, God the Son, to earth to take responsibility for our sins in full and to be nailed to that cross where He shed His blood and died to pay for it in full so that we could be forgiven. And He rose again to prove it.
And now God can look at us and see the sin and the destruction that it causes in our lives. And if we’ll simply accept that Jesus died in our place and believe in him as our savior, we’ll have that forgiveness that he provided, that he paid so much for, and begin to be restored to the Father and to walk in that fellowship we were created for.
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