#DailyDevotion Return To The LORD For Every Blessing
Joel 1 8Wail like a girl, girded with sackcloth, weeping over the man she married in her youth. 9The sacrifices of food and drink have been cut off from the LORD’s temple. The priests, the LORD’s servants, mourn. 10The fields are ruined, and the ground mourns because the grain is destroyed; the new wine is dried up; the fresh olive oil is dried up.
A third imperative in this chapter, “wail,” is given us. Wail like a girl weeping over the husband of her youth. Quite a scene this would be and the whole country is called to it, such is the devastation the locusts have caused. Even the ground mourns over the grain it produced has been destroyed. What is the destruction? The grain, the vineyards and the olive orchids have been wiped out by this plague of locusts. There’s hardly anything else left, vegetation wise, to eat, buy or sell. These were staples for the people. If the seed was spared for next years planting, they might be able to recover somewhat, but that probably wasn’t likely. The vineyards and orchards would take years to repair themselves. The country would be dependent upon imports, if they could afford them to survive.
On top of that, anyone who took comfort in the ritual sacrifices held at the temple, even that was taken away. There would be no grain for a wave offering, no wine for an offering and no olive oil for the sacrifices, for the anointings and for the light in the temple. The priests who served in the temple would not be getting their sustenance from the offerings that would be given. If there is no vegetation, then even even the animals, the sheep and the goats would be starving to death and there would be no sacrifices for sins, for the Day of Atonement, and the various and sundry other sacrifices. So it’s a double whammy for priests and people.
What did they do to move the LORD to take away their food? What did they do to take away their worship? What did the priests do to cause the LORD to bring this disaster upon them?
11You who plow, be disappointed. You who take care of the vines, wail for the wheat and the barley because the harvest of the fields is lost. 12The vines are withered; the fig trees dried up; pomegranates, palms, apple trees, all the trees in the fields are withered. Yes, joy has faded away from people.
Another command, “be disappointed,” is given. This time it is to those who plow. But those who take care of the vineyards are called to wail as well. The harvest of the fields is lost. Not only the fig trees have become withered but also the pomegranates, palms, apple trees and any other food bearing tree are withered. The locusts do a full and complete job on the people of the land. Joy has been taken completely away from them.
Joel does not tell us what they had done. What we can tell from this chapter, the best I can tell, is they were not turning to the LORD for every good. Perhaps they were relying on themselves. Perhaps they were turning to other gods. Wherever they went to receive good the LORD will call them to repent, to turn away from those things and to turn to Him. Who or what are we turning to for every good? To whom or what are we crediting our blessings? Let us now turn from those things and turn to the LORD our God and seek from every good thing in our lives.
Merciful God and Father, grant us repentant hearts so we may look to Your hands alone for every blessing. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.