18 Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people. 19 The Lord answered and said to his people, “Behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations. 20 “I will remove the northerner far from you, and drive him into a parched and desolate land, his vanguard into the eastern sea, and his rear guard into the western sea; the stench and foul smell of him will rise, for he has done great things. 21 “Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done great things! 22 Fear not, you beasts of the field, for the pastures of the wilderness are green; the tree bears its fruit; the fig tree and vine give their full yield. 23 “Be glad, O children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for he has given the early rain for your vindication; he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the latter rain, as before. 24 “The threshing floors shall be full of grain; the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25 I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you. 26 “You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame. 27 You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God and there is none else. And my people shall never again be put to shame.
People either loved, hated, or were simply confused by the ending of the Coen brothers’ film, “No Country for Old Men.” The movie was based on Cormac McCarthy’s novel by the same name. The film concludes with recently-retired and world-weary sheriff Ed Tom Bell, sitting at the kitchen table and recounting two strange dreams he had to his wife. You must understand that Ed Tom retires after being unable to save the life of a local man, Llewlyn Moss, who came upon a large stash of drug money and who was being hunted by the ruthless killer Anton Chigurh. Sheriff Ed Tom could neither save Moss nor catch Chigurh. The Sheriff is tired. He is broken. He does not understand the world and how it has become so dark. There is no country for old men like him. Importantly, he tells his cousin earlier in the film that he always thought when he got older that God would come into his life, but God had not come, Ed Tom says.
So we find him seated in his kitchen at the movie’s end. He is telling his wife about his dreams. Both dreams, he tells her, were about him and his deceased father. Here are his words:
I dont remember the first one all that well but it was about meetin him in town somewheres and he give me some money and I think I lost it. But the second one it was like we was both back in older times and I was on horseback goin through the mountains of a night. Goin through this pass in the mountains. It was cold and there was snow on the ground and he rode past me and kept on goin. Never said nothin. He just rode on past and he had this blanket wrapped around him and he had his head down and when he rode past I seen he was carryin fire in a horn the way people used to do and I could see the horn from the light inside of it, about the color of the moon. And in the dream I knew that he was goin on ahead and that he was fixin to make a fire somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold and I knew that whenever I got there he would be there. And then I woke up.
Then, after a quick shot of his wife’s face and back to his own, the movie abruptly cuts to black.
The end.
As I said, people either love, hate, or are confused by this abrupt enigmatic ending.
Put me in the first camp. I love that ending. Why? Because, to me, it is a statement of hope.
In this dark world of pain and judgment and loss and sadness and wickedness and judgment, there is the smallest glimmer of light—the fire in the horn—and the light has gone on before us “somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold” and we can know “that whenever we get there” it will be there.
It is a profoundly biblical image. “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5).
Joel 1 and the first half of Joel 2 depict the darkness of loss and of judgment. But our text, beginning in Joel 2:18, depicts light and restoration. Finally in the cold and dark we come upon the light! Here, we see the Lord answer the cries and prayers of His people and turn to respond. And this response gives us great hope! These words are light in the darkness, and they point to the coming of the light of the world, Jesus.
Is this a picture of future restoration or of present restoration for the believer? I believe we should say, “Yes!” to this question. Yes, this is a picture of ultimate restoration and healing that will come in the aftermath of the day of the Lord for His people. But, as George Eldon Ladd famously taught us, the Kingdom of God is “already/not yet.” That is, the future coming of the Kingdom of God can be seen even now. Jesus ushered in the beginning of the end. So this enables us to read a passage like this not only in light of the hope of ultimate restoration, but also in the light of restoration even now on this side of heaven.
What do the mercies of God look like when He turns to heal and bless His suffering people?
The Lord restores where once there was only loss.
The devastation of the locusts in chapter 1 and of the army in chapter 2 cannot be overstated. Israel was in darkness, the darkness of calamity and the darkness of judgment. They were a broken people, a people searching for light. Into the darkness, the Lord speaks. And when God speaks into the darkness, He speaks restoration where once there was only loss.
18 Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people. 19 The Lord answered and said to his people, “Behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations.
All that was lost with the locusts in chapter 1 and all that was lost to the army in chapter 2 (i.e., Eden becoming a desolate wilderness) is depicted now as being restored. Here we begin to see what we mean by the “already/not yet” Kingdom of God. Ultimate restoration of what has been lost will have to wait for heaven, but even now we begin to see the restoring hand of God. I have heard it in the testimonies of followers of Jesus my whole life, how Jesus has already begun restoring what was taken. I have seen Christians who just a short time earlier were broken and destitute and lost rejoice now, even with their scars, at the goodness of God! Our God is a restoring God.
In verses 18 and 19 we see God restoring Israel’s bounty and sustenance and provisions. Then, in verse 20, we see Him restoring their safety.
20 “I will remove the northerner far from you, and drive him into a parched and desolate land, his vanguard into the eastern sea, and his rear guard into the western sea; the stench and foul smell of him will rise, for he has done great things.
Who is “the northerner?” This is a reference to the army mentioned at the beginning of Joel 2:1–11, and some see in these words a reference to the locusts of chapter 1. But who is this? Elizabeth Achtemeier has made the interesting point that while some commentators see “the northerner” as referring “only to the locust hordes,” locusts “usually came from the south or southeast.” She further argues that the northerner here is best understood as “Jeremiah’s mysterious foe from the north (Jer 1:14–15; 4:6; 6:1, 22) and Ezekiel’s eschatological Gog (Ezek 38:6, 14–15; 39:1–2)” and that “the northerner” should be seen as “God’s instrument of wrath.”[1]
This is perhaps a personification, then, of the judgment of God or of divinely-permitted calamity. The 6th century church father Cassiodorus actually saw in verse 20 a reference to Satan and said that Joel “offers evidence about [the devil] with these words [of verse 20],” concluding:
We thank you, Lord, for this arrangement. What would the devil do if free, when he afflicts the world when bound?[2]
These are intriguing questions and possibilities, but this much is true: God will restore safety to the lives of His people and harvests to their scorched fields. The Lord restores where once there was only loss! He is the great Provider!
The Lord gives gladness where once there was only fear.
And as the Lord replaces loss with restoration, so He too replaces fear with gladness!
21 “Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done great things! 22 Fear not, you beasts of the field, for the pastures of the wilderness are green; the tree bears its fruit; the fig tree and vine give their full yield. 23 “Be glad, O children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for he has given the early rain for your vindication; he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the latter rain, as before.
Let us note first the totality of the call for gladness: “Fear not, O land…Fear not, you beasts…Be glad, O children of Zion…” All that was affected by the calamity and the judgment can now take heart: land, beast, and human beings. Note that Joel 2:21–23 maintains the order of creation from Genesis 1: land, beast, human beings. This is a powerful note of hope because it speaks of a new earth to come!
Note, too, how the absence of fear gives way to the presence of gladness in our text’s progression: “Fear not…fear not…be glad…” It is not just that God removes fear. It is also that God establishes gladness and joy!
Verse 23’s reference to the rains is also a powerful statement about the completeness of God’s reconstitution of joy among His people.
23 “Be glad, O children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for he has given the early rain for your vindication; he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the latter rain, as before.
Tchavadar Hadjiev points out that “three different words for rain are used in verse 23” and that these three words, used in four references (“early rain” is repeated, bringing the references to four), match and counterbalance the four kinds of locusts mentioned in verse 25.[3]
- Early rain (v.23) / swarming locust (v.25)
- Abundant rain (v.23) / the hopping locust (v.25)
- Early rain (v.23) / the destroying locust (v.25)
- Latter rain (v.23) / the cutting locust (v.25)
This is beautiful! There is no wound that God will not tend, no area of loss that God will not heal, no devastation into which God will not sow gladness. For the people of God, every area of blight will become Eden again, and the desert will bloom! Consider the next two verses:
24 “The threshing floors shall be full of grain; the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25 I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you.”
My goodness what a word! “I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten…” Not fully on this side of heaven, but the work does begin now! Do not underestimate the present provision and healing of God! Ultimate healing will come, yes, but that does not mean that healing cannot begin now! Do not let the locusts steal your joy! God will restore what they have taken!
The Lord gives worship where once there was only despair.
Restoration gives way to gladness and then gladness gives way to worship. Watch:
26 “You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame.
“…and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dwelt wondrously with you.” The restored heart is to be a worshiping heart! Why? Because it knows from whence it has come and it has seen the healing hand of God.
Worship soars on wings of gratitude.
Worship has a song of glad recognition of the goodness of God!
We have spoken, in reflecting on chapter 1 of Joel, of lament, the worship of pain and of tears and, indeed, of wailing. We have spoken of agonizing worship, and we thank God for allowing us to lament when the locusts come. But there is also a worship of joy and gladness!
Restoration leads to gladness which leads to worship. And what does worship result in?
27 You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God and there is none else. And my people shall never again be put to shame.
Worship leads to the deepening of relationship with our great God: “You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel…”
There is a very small step between “praise the name of the Lord” and “You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel…”
The theologian and historian, David Bentley Hart, has spoken of the unique contribution of Christianity when compared to early paganism. He writes:
This is not to say that Christian culture ever wholly succeeded in resisting contamination by pagan melancholy and gravity, or even that it ever fully purged itself of this unwelcome alloy. But the “new thing” that the gospel imparted to the world in which it was born and grew was something that pagan religion could only occasionally adumbrate but never sustain, and that pagan philosophy would, in most cases, have found shameful to promote: a deep and imperturbable joy.[4]
Yes, so many today only see darkness with no hope of light. They cannot conceive of any legitimate basis for joy, for gladness, much less for the worship in which gladness should result. But Christianity is the basis for joy because Christianity posits that Christ Himself is the light that shines in the darkness…and Christ has come! As Christopher Wright has written:
With the advent of Jesus, the messianic reign of God has arrived. But although God’s new age has begun, the old age is still with us. And so we live in the meantime. Still in the wilderness of this world, we are refreshed by the promised “streams in the desert” as we anticipate the “everlasting joy” of entering the Zion of the new creation with all God’s redeemed.[5]
So the light is shining now! Even with all of the loss and pain and sorrow of the world, God is even now making all things new. He will do so ultimately at the end of days, but He is doing so now in ways that the Christian sees and in which the Christian rejoices.
How is He doing it? Through Christ operating in and through the lives of His children. And how has Christ wrought this great work or restoration leading to gladness? By stepping into the darkness of the world, bearing the curse of the world upon Himself on the cross of Calvary, defeating sin, death, and hell, and inviting all who will come into the Kingdom!
Joel 2:18–27 moves us from healing to gladness to worship. Some have even suggested that this section of Joel 2 represents a corporate antiphonal chant than Israel may have used in worship along these lines:
- Prophetic introduction (2:18)
- Yahweh’s response (2:19–20)
- The prophet’s answer (2:21–24)
- Yahweh’s final word (2:25–27)[6]
Whether this is so or not, let us conclude by saying our text together along these suggested lines.
Responsive Reading of Joel 2:18–27
18 Then the Lord became jealous for his land and had pity on his people.
19 The Lord answered and said to his people, “Behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations. 20 “I will remove the northerner far from you, and drive him into a parched and desolate land, his vanguard into the eastern sea, and his rear guard into the western sea; the stench and foul smell of him will rise, for he has done great things.
21 “Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done great things! 22 Fear not, you beasts of the field, for the pastures of the wilderness are green; the tree bears its fruit; the fig tree and vine give their full yield. 23 “Be glad, O children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for he has given the early rain for your vindication; he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the latter rain, as before. 24 “The threshing floors shall be full of grain; the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
25 I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you. 26 “You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame. 27 You shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the Lord your God and there is none else. And my people shall never again be put to shame.
And the people of God say, “Amen!”
[1] Achtemeier, Elizabeth. “Joel.” The New Interpreter’s Bible. Vol. VII (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1996), p.323.
[2] Ferreiro, Alberto. The Twelve Prophets. Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture. Gen. ed. Thomas C. Oden. Old Testament XIV (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003), p.72.
[3] Hadjiev, Tchavdar S. Joel and Amos. Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries. Vol. 25 (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2020), p.41.
[4] David Bentley Hart, Atheist Delusions. Kindle, 1932-35.
[5] https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2019/december-web-only/your-god-will-come.html
[6] Crenshaw, James L. Joel. The Anchor Bible. Gen. eds. William Foxwell Albright and David Noel Freedman. Vol. 24c (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1995), p.160–161.