Exposition on Joel - Introduction - 3

     Several themes surface throughout the progress of Joel’s prophesy: the Day of the Lord and repentance. Then again, one could say that Joel’s style is really just characterized by variations on one theme—repentance. In chapter one he uses the drunkard, the priest, the invading army and later, the final Day of Judgment, all as means of calling the nation to corporate repentance. And in chapters 2 and 3 we see the promises of judgment and salvation finally meted out in the Day of the Lord: an eschatological final day which is depicted throughout redemptive history in lesser, but still terrible, days of destruction and deliverance. We observe one of the more prominent features of the promises and fulfillment to God’s beneficiaries in His Spirit: promised in Joel chapter 3 and fulfilled in Acts chapter 2. We can also observe the importance of the themes of the mourning and the lamenting of the sin of Judah; and of course a call to their repentance, which necessarily becomes a call to consecrate fasting and assembly in order to corporately lament the sins of the nation. In addition the mention of the mourning of the very land itself—the beasts of the field, the pastures, vineyards, the languishing olive groves and the gladness of the people having dried up along with the impoverishment of their physical resources.

Specifically regarding the Day of the Lord, Joel uses the term to describe 2 events: the recent torment on the land, an army described as locusts in chapter one, and the future and terrible Day wherein the evil nations will be judged in the Valley of Jehoshaphat, described in chapter 2. Unlike most of the other prophets, simply warning the people by predicting the actual futuristic nature of the coming Day of Yahweh or the Day of the Lord, in Joel it is more so the gasoline fueling the fire of His oracles. So significant is the concept of the DotL to Joel’s prophesy that it is strategically placed in every one of the four major subsections of the book, thus making it undeniable crucial to the idea God had for Joel to preach. The concept of that Day in the book of Joel follows a pattern similar to the OT prophecies of Christ coming: as we know today, Christ’s coming was to be two-fold: first in humiliation and second and finally in His coming in glory. The OT saint likely had confused the two due to their frequent compression, as they were often spoken of as though they were one future “coming”, and in like manner, the OT saint had likely confused the final deliverance that could be expected by believers at the DotL with the destruction that was to be expected at the DotL. So they were shocked to learn of their exile as a form of the punishment provided for in the context of the DotL. The notion of the Day of the Lord is more fully expressed in the New Testament where we get a more complete picture than that provided by any pre-Messianic prophesy. And such is the nature of prophesy in general, it normally follows this pattern: prophesy, then fulfillment, and then understanding. However, it can be demonstrated by our present concern in Joel that understanding is truly partial when we look at how the Jews in the OT thought of the Day of the Lord. After Joel’s prophesy and prior to the NT exposition of the concept, most Jews regarded the Day as being exclusively a day when the wrongs perpetrated against the people of Israel would be righted. But in Joel and in some NT passages we discover that unbelieving Jews (an unbelief manifest in gross and perpetual disobedience) will be judged in that Day along with the evildoers of other nations.

You see, in Joel’s day and even in Christ’s day, especially before Paul in Eph. 2:11-22 helped reform the world’s understanding of the mystery that ALL nations would be brought into the commonwealth of Israel via their adoption through the blood of the Ultimate and final Passover Lamb, Jesus of Nazareth, and all those (Israeli and gentile) unbelievers would receive God’s wrath on that final Day. The Jews believed that their pedigree through the familial line of Abraham alone was their ticket to being the beneficiaries of God, regardless of their actions; no one, they thought, could take that from them. They believed, and thus rightly held in very high regard, that the ritual circumcision of an 8 day old babe ensured that none of God’s wrath would finally be poured out on that individual. But Paul in Romans 2 would later inform us that not all Israel are of Israel—it is our faith, which is the very gift of God, proved by our good works that separates God’s children from the children of the Devil, not the application of a covenant sign alone. Likewise with the continuation of covenant signage, now by the covenant baptism of our infants into visible church membership, we as parents and other onlookers who partake in the grace mediated by that sacrament, fully expect God to later regenerate that baptized baby—He has set His mark on that little helpless and virtually unresponsive one who will ordinarily inherit genuine belief. But those who have tasted of the benefits of God through this nurturing, yet finally apostatize and fall away are the exception to the rule, thus are much more liable to God’s severe wrath because they tasted His grace first hand; consider 2 Pet. 2:1-3.