I just started. Wouldn't even
thought twice about it. Joel. If you'll take your Bibles
and turn with me to Joel. We'll be looking at several parts
of these three chapters of this blessed book of Joel. This, if I had a title, it'd
just be Gleanings from Joel. We're going to go through several
things in this chapter. And the chapters divide themselves
into four parts. The first part is chapter 1,
and part of chapter 2 deal with the desolation, the desolation
of the land by locusts or insects. There was a desolation, a judgment
of God upon the land. The second part, beginning in
chapter 2, deals with the call to repentance. You see,
he said, blow the trumpet in Zion, sound the alarm, and calling
the people to repentance because of the judgment of God. And the
third part is the precious mercies of God, in chapter 2, And verses
18, the promises of God to restore all things and to send His Holy
Spirit. And you'll be very familiar with
verse 28 of chapter 2, which is the prophecy of the outpouring
of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. So 18 through verse
27 is a picture of Christ is to show us that Christ had
come to restore or to take away and remove our sins. And verse
28, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. And the last part is
verse chapter 3, which is the fulfillment of all things. The
calling into judgment of the wicked and the calling into glory
of the righteous. So we have here the whole counsel
of God in three chapters. It's wonderful. It's amazing.
We see it all by these. We see the judgment of God upon
man because of sin. We see the locusts of the land
as going to be the false prophets that scatter out and destroy
the vine, which is the gospel. We see the pleading of God's
men, the ministers, to blow the trumpet, to call men to repentance
and faith in Christ, because Christ has removed our sin, the
Holy Spirit is poured out, and God is coming in judgment. So
that's the whole of God's prophecy. So by this whole thing, we cannot
escape the truth that God is absolutely sovereign in all things. You cannot see this little book
and how that God has purposed the beginning to the end and
everything in the middle and miss that everything moves according
to the will of God. Throughout this book, we're going
to see that this is the sovereignty of God. Ever since the fall of
man, man has been trying to figure out who runs the show. Everybody's
been trying to figure this out. You know, the philosophers, Plato,
Socrates, morons. They determine that some say
that, well, it's fate that controls the destiny of man. It's will,
it's free will that controls the destiny of man. Some men
believe governments control the destiny of men. Some believe
it's morality or self-indulgence that controls destiny. Some believe
in this modern generation is just downright genetics. That's how they think that this
world is controlled or made better. But left to himself, man will
never figure out the simple truth of it. God rules over all things
in time and eternity. This whole show is being run
by God. I think Shakespeare said it right
when he said, the world is a stage. And it is true. And God is playing
out His purposes on the stage of time and history. God is sovereign
and He is moving everything, everything after the counsel
of His own sovereign free will. If there's anybody who has free
will, it is God and God alone, and every will is subject to
God's will. God's will. God's moving everything. The answer to this question is
simple. But yet man, left to himself,
can never figure it out. And when confronted with it...
Now, I've just confronted you with it. And if you are left
to yourself, you will never admit the truth of it. That God is
sovereign in all things. God is God. And He controls all
things. God is Jehovah, our Savior. And that One who controls all
things, listen, is Jesus Christ, the Lord. To Him, the Father
has given all power. to move all things for this singular
purpose, to save His people. When you're ever confused as
to what's going on around you, you better mark this down, put
it down. God is moving everything for
the salvation of His people. Kings and governments and us. God is moving everything. for
the salvation and good of His people. All things work together
for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according
to His purpose. Now soon all men will be forced
to see this. All men will be forced to see
this. That the Scriptures are clear. Every knee shall bow,
every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory
of God the Father. This will happen without exception. We see very plainly in the Scriptures
all things, Paul said in Colossians, all things were made by Him and
for Him. And without Him was not anything
made that was made. Behold the truth of all time
and providence and circumstance, past, present, and future, are
not by fate or man's will, but rather determined by the sovereign
free grace of God from eternity. Therefore, in our text, in this
book of Joel, so now this is very, this very moment, He has
worked up until this moment His sovereign will, and at this moment
God is working His sovereign will, and after this moment God
will work His sovereign will. So we have God working His will
in the past. We have God working His will
in the present. And we have God's working His
will in the future. We're going to see all of those
in the book of Job. You'll see what God has done. You'll see
what God is doing. You'll see what God's going to do. And I love Scripture because
Scripture, when it speaks of God's purpose, is not iffy. There's no ifs with God. God says, I will and you shall.
It's very certain what God will do. Now God moves, I like this
song, God moves in a mysterious way. His wonders to perform. He plants His footsteps in the
sea and rides upon the storm. deep in unfathomable minds of
never failing skill, He treasures up His bright design. And what
does He do? He works His sovereign will. Now do you desire to know who
is ruling and controlling all things? You desire to know why
all things are as they are? Then you must know this, God
is God and you're not. You must come to this. If you're
ever to understand anything in time, you must understand this.
God is God and is working all things after the counsel of His
will. And you know what? There's only one God. There's
only one God. I like this, in Isaiah chapter
46, the Lord is, I believe you can see it clearly, He's laying
on sarcasm pretty thick. He said, you guys, you go out
and you bake something, you prepare a fire and you bake your dinner,
and then when it's done, you take that burnt piece of wood,
you use your imagination, carve out a God, you stick it on the
back of an ox and you move it where you will. You see, every false god needs
to be carried. If your god needs to be carried
by you, he's not God. These gods, these false gods
that are made by man's imagination, well, they're subject to man's
will. Their god can be moved or nailed
down. They can hide from their god. And their God is not sovereign.
They are. But their God is not God. If
your God can be moved, hid from, or put away, He's not God. The poor pitiful deity of this
age is a confused deity. That's just so easy. This poor
miserable God of this generation is confused. He had it all purposed
and planned out with Adam, and it just got all messed up. Somehow,
Satan came in and just messed everything up, and in plan B,
he sent his son to die. in hopes, fingers crossed, that
somehow man would be saved by his decision or free will. That God is not God. That's not
the God of the book of Joel. That's not the God of the Bible.
And that's not the Christ of Scripture. Even because our God
says this, I am God and there's none else. There's none like
me, declaring the end from the beginning. And from ancient times
of things that were not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand,
and I will do all my pleasure. Now that is God. Now that's God. Anybody not like
that is not God at all. That's God. Now listen in your
text. And keep this in the forefront
of your mind as we go through this book. and see some things
here in the book of Joel. In this book of Joel, we are
told of a time of this, we're not told the time of this prophecy,
and we're not given much about the information about the prophet
Joel. It just comes out and says in verse 1, the word of the Lord
that came to Joel. Who's Joel? I don't know. I don't know. That's very comforting. That's
very comforting. This tells me that in every age,
God has a man for that generation and that people. Though nobody
will ever know who he is, nobody will ever know he was even in
existence. The only reason we know this
is written by Joel is because we're given that in the first
chapter, the first verse. If that wasn't there, then we
wouldn't even know his name. But that's alright, he's insignificant,
isn't he? But God put His name there because His name means
Jehovah is God. That's what His name means. So
we don't know who this man is or when this actually was. And
all this book of Joel does is show forth the sovereignty of
God. Now, as I've read men about this,
studied, commentaries and different things, I've noticed that some
of these men, these men that I've read, you know, they served
their generation and they're now gone. They served their generation
and only a few of them have works left. You know, only a few of
them have written books that have extended past in time. That's
alright. Some of these men, nobody ever
knew who they were. But God has His men to do this
even as Joel did. Joel was sent for one purpose.
To preach the gospel. To declare God's purpose. And so, that's what we as preachers
to our generation are to do the same as Joel. He said, the Word
of the Lord that came to Joel. This is the Word of the Lord
that I preach to you. It's the same Word of Joel. The
same word that God gave Joel is the same word He gives to
every one of His prophets, every one of His preachers. And He
tells us to go and preach it. Therefore, as I tell you the
gospel of God's grace in Christ, which is the word of the sovereign
God, which is purposed, accomplished, and applied to all of His elect,
and you may be sure that God will continue from generation
to generation to send his men to preach it. I know that this church, this
congregation is moving locations. That matters not at all. It doesn't. Why? Because God,
when He sends man to preach, God will provide all that is
necessary for the people they preach to. God will provide for
them and God will provide for that ministry when God sends
it. He's done this for generations. And you know what? Long after
we're gone, He'll keep doing it. He'll keep doing it. And so we don't need to worry
about this. God is sovereign. He has sent His men to do one
thing, and to preach the gospel. And by this preaching, God has
chosen to be the means to save His people. Now let us attend
to the gospel then according to Joel. And the first thing
I want us to see is a present judgment. A present judgment
upon the people. Verses 4, beginning here. He's asking the question to these
elders. He said, has this ever been in
your generation? And you tell your children, tell
the next generation, verse 4, that which the palmer worm hath
left the locust eaten, and that which the locust hath left the
canker worm hath eaten, and that which the canker worm hath left
the caterpillar eaten. Awake, drunkards, and weep and
howl, you drinkers of wine, because the new wine For it is cut off
from your mouth, for the nation is come up upon my land, a strong
and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and
he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion. He hath laid my vine waste
and barked my fig tree. He hath made it clean bare, and
cast it away. The branches thereof are made
white. Verse 9, the meat offering and
the drink offering are cut off from the house of the Lord. The
priest and the Lord's ministers mourn. The field is wasted, the
land mourneth, the corn is wasted, the new wine is dried up, the
oil languisheth. He has shamed you husbandmen,
how, you vine dressers, for the wheat and for the barley, because
the harvest of the field is perished, the vine is dried up." You get
the picture? It's a wasteland. There's nothing left. Everything
is wasted by these insects, this plague that God has brought into
the land as a judgment against their sin. It's a desolate place. Everything is eat up. So even
the worship of God is ceased. There's no offering to give. Because there's no wine, there's
no fruit on the vine, there's no cows, there's no everything
starved to death. A man named Hodgkins wrote this
about locusts, and I want you to see the comparison here that
this is what's happened. Locusts have come in this land.
He said, an army of locusts is incredible to those who've never
seen it. They fill and darken the sun like an eclipse. They
spread for miles over the land. They advance columns, will attack
all that is green and succulent. And in half an hour, every leaf
and blade is destroyed. Others in succession will strip
the bark from the trees. The land so desolate may take
years to recover. He said the noise of their wings
are like you can be heard for miles, and their feeding sounds
like a fire. The land which they have passed
hath the appearance of a fire-swept earth. They, having stripped
the country, then will scale the walls of the city in closed-rank
formation like mailed horsemen and chariots, marching into houses,
consuming everything that can be consumed by an onslaught."
This is exactly how Job pictures this scene. Look at that, he
said, the vine is waste, the bark, the tree is bark. They've
even eaten the bark from the tree. The field is wasted. Verse 3 of chapter 2, a fire
devoureth before them, and behind them a flame burneth, and the
land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them
is a desolate wilderness. You see the picture? Now, this plague of locusts that
consumed the land was because of the sin of Israel. This plague
was one of great sorrow and misery. The crops were bare and the livestock
were starving to death. And therefore, even the worship
of God was ceased. This present manifest judgment
of God had fallen upon them. Now consider how much that is
a picture of even the present judgment of men today. That's what it's there for. You
know, whether they had their fields eaten with locusts thousands
of years ago, what does that affect us? How does that affect
you and me? God meant it for a spiritual application. It's
a spiritual application. Listen, there is a present judgment
upon men. It is called spiritual death. The present judgment of man has
fallen. When our father Adam ate and
he died, the locusts of sin had come in and devoured the righteousness
of man. There is no more righteousness
of man. The worship of God is ceased
from man. He cannot worship God. Why? Because he himself is defiled. The vine is withered. There is
no goodness in us to merit God's favor. We, by nature, are a locust-eating
wilderness, a barren wasteland on the inside of our hearts. And listen, there's another judgment
because of this. There is a famine. Just as there
was no seed, no good, no fruit coming out of the ground, that
caused starvation. And because of man's sin, there
is a plague upon the land, even a famine in this land. Not a
famine of bread. Man, we ate good last night.
We had steaks galore. We had food. I mean, we are blessed
in this country with food. We've got plenty. I was telling
Terrence, if something happened, we all had to farm, we'd be in
trouble. We don't know how to can a can of beans, except we
buy it at the store. But I'm telling you, we have
plenty of food here, but this is not a physical famine of food. God says, I will send a famine
in the land, not of bread, but what? A famine of the Word of
God. There is a famine in the land.
It is a famine of the Word of God. There is no greater famine than
spiritual famine. of hearing of Jesus Christ. There's
no greater famine. And yet we live in such a day
when there's a church on every corner and yet the Word of God
is not preached. There are five churches on this
very road today and I know of only this one preaching the gospel
of Jesus Christ. It's a famine! It's a famine. The gospel of Christ is not heard,
and the souls of men starve to death. On the husks of free will
works religion. The flesh is puffed up, sure. The flesh is edified. The flesh
is fattened by charismatic so-called gifts and visions. The flesh
is puffed up by the will of man as exalted above the blood and
will of God. The brains of men are tickled
with religion and theology and men beat upon their chest debating
one another and the Word of God is not preached. Behold, because Christ is not
preached, God is not declared to be sovereign as He declares
Himself, the souls of men on the brink of eternity perish
for the lack of God's Word. Man has not a physical problem,
he has a spiritual problem. The problem is the heart. The
problem is not the flesh. It's not correcting the outer
man. He needs a new heart. He needs to be raised from the
dead. You don't need new habits. You
need new life. And that comes by the preaching
of the Word of God. I tell you that false religion
reminds me most definitely of these locusts. False religion is as a strong
army, a nation of locusts. They devour everything and give
nothing. They take everything and give
nothing. You realize that false religion
cannot do anything? God said in Jeremiah chapter
23, what did He tell us about false religion? He said, they
will not profit this people at all. They'll take your money, they'll
take your time, they'll take your labor, they'll take your
effort, and they'll give you death. That's it. They'll give you a withered branch.
They'll take every green thing. They're like locusts. They block
out the sun of righteousness. They devour the only vine, Jesus
Christ, and give you an imitation branch that's withered and cannot
save. They strip the gospel of its
power by the addition of works and man's will. Paul says, I
was sent to preach the gospel not with wisdom of words. What
are you saying, Paul, that you didn't have any wisdom? Is that
what you're saying? No, he's saying I didn't come to preach
to you in man's wisdom. Man's wisdom is what? Christ
plus whatever. That's man's wisdom. That's natural
wisdom. That can be found anywhere. It
can be found anywhere. Man's wisdom is Christ plus works
or will, Christ plus obedience to the law. But he said, I didn't
come to preach man's wisdom. Lest the cross of Christ be made
of none effect. You realize that? That they,
when they put man's work to it, they make the cross of Christ
impotent. Can't have any power. They've
defiled it. That's what Moses said, when
you build me an altar of earth, do not put your hand to a tool
against it, lest you pollute the altar. And that's what man
does when he lifts up his work to God's work, is he pollutes
it. He makes it defiled. And as Joel said here in verse
3 of chapter 2, he says, The fire devoureth before them, and
the flame behind them burneth. The land is as the Garden of
Eden before them, and behind them is a desolate wilderness.
Every day they'll come up and they'll open this book, and the
Garden of Eden is before them. Here it is. This is as the Garden
of Eden. And you know what they do when
they're finished? It's a burnt wasteland. That's what false
religion does. And that's the present judgment
on this land. That's the present judgment upon
man. Behold the Son of God in His
glory and His redemption is revealed in this book. And they burn it. Here's the
Garden of Eden. God has chosen a people before
the foundation of the world. That's the Garden of Eden. That's
beautiful. Had God not made choice among
us, we would have all been as Sodom and unlikened to Gomorrah. In grace, He chose a people before
the world began. In love, predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ. The Father gave us to
His Son and put all His elect in Christ. And behold, the glorious
Son of God, according to the covenant of grace, came in the
flesh to redeem His people, of which He said, I should lose
nothing and raise it up again at the last day. So the Lord
Jesus Christ came and died upon the tree. He was made sin for
us. He bore our sins in His own body
on the tree. and hath redeemed us from the
curse of the law by being made a curse for us, so that all of
his elect are redeemed forever. This is pictured to us in what
Joel says here in verse 18 of chapter 2. He said, then will the Lord be
jealous for His land, and pity His people. Yea, the Lord will
answer and say to His people, Behold, I will send you corn
and wine and oil, and you shall be satisfied therewith, and I
will no more make you a reproach among the heathen, but I will
remove far off from you the northern army, and will drive him into
a land barren and desolate. What is that? He's going to remove
the judgment. He's going to remove far from
us what? Our sin. This is the Garden of
Eden. This is the Word of God. Christ
came to save His people by His blood, not His blood plus our
works, not His blood plus our will, but by His own blood, He
entered into the very presence of God on the behalf of His people,
and God says, I accept His offering. I'm satisfied. The justice of
God was satisfied. Scripture says, by His blood
having That's a good word. Means he
already got it. Already got it. You know what's
seen in heaven? When the Lord Jesus Christ as
a lamb stood before the throne and he took the book from the
hand of God. What did he do? He obtained it.
Took it. Why? He had a right to it. He
took it. He obtained it. And what did
he do when he obtained it? He obtained eternal redemption. Now that's a good, that's a good
message. Why? It's the gospel. That's
the gospel. Eternal redemption. He obtained
eternal redemption. Behold the locus of false religion.
They'll devour that up. They'll chew that up and spit
it out. They don't have any interest in that. They'll burn it up.
And all who follow them are fruitless and have no seed of righteousness
in them. Now throughout this book, I know
I'm going long on time. Let's see. Okay. In this book,
we can read five different times of the day of the Lord in verse
15 of chapter 1. He says, Alas, the day of the
Lord, for the day of the Lord is at hand. Talking about the
present judgment. The present judgment. And as
a destruction from the Almighty shall it come. So you have judgment
present and you have judgment coming. And in verse one, blow
the trumpet, for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at
hand. Verse 11, it says, and the Lord
shall utter his voice before his army, for his camp is very
great, for he is strong and executeth his word. For the day of the
Lord is great and very terrible, who can abide it? Now this has
reference to both present judgment and future judgment. In this
day of the Lord, Joel was warning. He was warning the people. There was a present judgment,
but what did the present judgment do? What was it for? It was to
warn them of future judgment. I tell you of present judgment
because there's a greater judgment coming. There's a greater judgment
coming. It is to manifest the greater
judgment of God. The present judgment is the rejection
of God's Word, the absence of God's Word, but there's a day
coming that's far worse than today. It's a day when God will
come in vengeance and judgment upon all flesh. Now, because of the present judgment,
who then can abide? Because of man's sin and unrighteousness,
because your crop of righteousness has been eaten up, and the worship
of God has ceased, how then can you abide in the present of the
coming judgment? It's a warning. God says this,
My spirit shall not always strive with man. That's a warning. It's
a warning. Listen, you and I must face God.
There's just no way around it. My son, I will not face God for
you. You will face God on your own.
And so will you. So will I. You will face God. Run if you please. flee from
his voice, cry to the mountains and rocks to fall on you and
hide you from the wrath of the Lamb. I like this. Military snipers
used to have a motto. It says, don't bother running,
you'll only die tired. That's what God says. Don't bother running. Because vengeance is mine, I
will repay, saith the Lord. The soul that sinneth, it shall
surely die. Therefore, because of this, because
of this present judgment, Joel sends out a cry. He calls men to repentance. Look at that in verse 1 of chapter
2. Well, he says it first in verse 13 of chapter 1. Gird yourselves! Lament, you priests! Howl, you
ministers of the altar! Come and lie all night in sackcloth,
you ministers of God! For the meat offering and the
drink offering is withholden from the house of God. Verse
1 of chapter 2. Blow the trumpet in Zion. Sound
the alarm in the holy mountain. Let all the inhabitants of the
land tremble, for the day of the Lord cometh and is nigh at
hand. You see, he's warning men. Warning
men. This is the cry of every man
that from the crown of your head to the sole of your foot is no
soundness. How shall you abide in the day of God? What then is the hope? If God's going to have judgment,
God's already had judgment, God is going to have judgment, what
then is the hope for man? I'll tell you, there wouldn't
be any hope if God didn't say something. I'll tell you, God says everything
right here. Look at chapter 2 and verse 12.
Look what God says. Therefore, also now, saith the
Lord. Therefore, then, and also when,
now, now, saith the Lord, Turn ye to Me with all your heart,
and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning, and rend your
heart, and not your garments. Turn unto the Lord your God,
for He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness,
and repenteth Him of the evil. I want you to understand this.
This is not a suggestion. It's a command. God says something,
He's not suggesting. He's not a God of suggestion.
He's a God of command. Turn! Turn ye! Repent! Every one of you, repent
and turn! You know what is repentance?
It's a change of mind. I hope to deal with this in the
next message, but it's a change of mind. You need to change your
mind as to how God saves sinners. Because your way is absolutely
dead wrong. Man's way is dead wrong. God
says, you need to turn with me. Turn to me. And don't turn to
me with portions. Yeah, well, I've made my decision
for God. I've done all, you know, for
God. He don't want part of you. He
must have all of you or he's not going to have any of you.
Turn with all your heart unto me. Wrench your heart and not
your garments. How many people, oh, I'm just
so sinful. Oh, they cry and they cry and
they weep and their heart's all broken. Next week, they're right
back in the vomit. No change, no difference. They
felt a little twinge of guilt for a moment. They felt maybe
the fires of hell under their feet. And sure enough, they ran
down, made some decision, prayed some prayer, and said, oh, it's
all right now. No, God said, don't rend your
garments. Don't make a show. God don't want your show. Tell
you the truth, neither do I. I've seen enough shows. I don't
want a show. Now you rend your heart right
where you are. No need to show me. Rend your heart before God because
of your sin. Man's heart's the problem. You
need a new one. And only God can give you a new
one. And when God gives you a new one, you won't have any part
rending it. You won't have any part. That
means you won't have any trouble rending it. You will flee to
Christ without thinking. It will be as natural to you
as breathing to flee to Christ. That's what a new heart is. That's
what a new nature is. It's faith in Christ alone. And you gladly flee. You gladly
flee. Behind you is nothing more than
a desolate wasteland. You gladly leave that for Christ. You gladly do. That's what it
is to have a new heart. Not false humility. Some people like Jesus, they
enjoy the benefits of religion, but have no love or desire for
God or his people. But when God strips a man, when
God strips a man, he will come to Christ gladly. And he will
find this, he is gracious and merciful. Have you found that? I have, I found Him to be gracious
and merciful. How do I know He's so gracious?
How do I know? Because of what it said in verses
18 down through the end of the chapter, because of what Christ
has done. That's how I know He's gracious?
I know that God does merciful things for me every day, but
I'm not going to be able to look at these things in space and
in my circumstance and find God's graciousness. I have to look
to the cross. To see God's grace and mercy,
I must always look to Christ. And never apart from Christ will
I find grace and mercy. Someone once just wrote this
recently. He said, don't look to the promises of God. You must
look to Christ who is the fulfillment of the promises of God. He is the fulfillment of God's
promises. Without Him, none of these promises
are in effect. We believe on Christ. We trust
Christ. And you know what? Only somebody
who has a need of forgiveness is going to seek
forgiveness. And the moment a person seeks
forgiveness through Christ, you know what they find? They find
forgiveness. Why? Because He promised this
in verse 28 through the end of the chapter, I will pour out
My Spirit. Hasn't that already happened
on the day of Pentecost? Did He not fulfill this text
of Scripture? Yes! And then from that point it says,
Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered.
What a promise. And in chapter three, I'm going
to close with this quickly. Chapter three is the summation
of it all. He comes in and he says, for
behold in those days and at that time when I shall bring again
the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem. I will also gather all nations
and bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat. This is where that time Jehoshaphat
was surrounded by his enemies and he prayed to God and God
says the battle's not yours, it's mine. And what I want you
to do, I want you to set yourselves in battle, get your troops all
together, gather them, put the armor on them, get them out to
the field, and you go down there, and you know what happened? They
just watched as the enemies killed themselves. The Lord destroyed
them all in their presence. Killed them. by a miraculous
delivery. You know what's going to happen
when we all gather together at the end? God's people are all
going to be arrayed in their finest, the robes of Christ's
righteousness. You know what we're going to
do? We're going to watch our enemies be cast in a lake of fire and
rejoice. Did you get that? It'll be the
happiest day of your life. When all your enemies are gone.
No more sin. No more temptation, no more struggles,
no more tears. God's going to gather us all
together and we shall be forever rejoicing. Can you imagine your happiest
time here? It doesn't even compare with what you will experience
in glory forever with him. He says this at the end, and
it shall come to pass at that day that the mountains shall
drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all
the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and the fountains
shall come forth of the house of the Lord, and shall water
the valley of Shittim. That's another one. If you want
to study that later, you can. That was a desolate place. It
was a place of sin. And God says, now I'm watering
it. I'm going to make it full of water. Egypt shall be a desolation. Edom shall be a desolate wilderness. for the violence against the
children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in the
land. But Judah shall dwell forever, and Jerusalem from generation
to generation, for I will cleanse their blood that have not cleansed. For the
Lord dwelleth in Zion." What's the whole promise at the end? God says there'll be a fountain,
right? Rivers of water of life and on each side will be the
trees for the healing of the nation. Isn't that what John
says? So what do we have in Joel? We
have the whole counsel of God in three chapters. Sovereignty of God. Present judgment
of God. Warning of the future judgment
of God. a call to repentance, the death of Christ, the outpouring
of the Holy Spirit, and the gathering of God's saints, all in three
chapters. I pray God bless that to you.