Joel 1:1-5

God uses natural disasters, even those caused by human negligence, to remind us of His power. To remind us that the world is under His control not mans’. Only in the newness of the Holy Spirit given in the salvation the Father provided in Jesus can we be guided. When you hear of war and rumors of wars, earthquakes and an increase in natural phenomena’s…Look up His return nears.

Natural disasters—from rising flood waters to violent earthquakes—provoke fear and dread. With all their ingenuity, people still cannot control these powerful and destructive forces. They can only watch in awe. Joel begins his book with a description of such a natural disaster—a plague of ravenous locusts. In the prophet’s hands, the destructiveness of this plague becomes a vivid warning of the power of God’s coming judgment and a clear appeal to run to the Lord for mercy.

The calamity of recent days was unprecedented in the memory of the people. Joel’s description of the damage done by the locusts compares with eyewitness reports. The impression given is one of overwhelming devastation.

Joel 1:1-5

1 The word of the Lord that came to Joel the son of Pethuel.

The Land Laid Waste

² Hear this, you elders,

And give ear, all you inhabitants of the land!

Has anything like this happened in your days,

Or even in the days of your fathers?

³ Tell your children about it,

Let your children tell their children,

And their children another generation.

⁴ What the chewing locust left, the swarming locust has eaten;

What the swarming locust left, the crawling locust has eaten;

And what the crawling locust left, the consuming locust has eaten.

⁵ Awake, you drunkards, and weep;

And wail, all you drinkers of wine,

Because of the new wine,

For it has been cut off from your mouth.

¹⁶ But this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: 

Acts 2:16

⁷ Alas! For that day is great, So that none is like it; And it is the time of Jacob’s trouble, But he shall be saved out of it. 

Jeremiah 30:7

² and that you may tell in the hearing of your son and your son’s son the mighty things I have done in Egypt, and My signs which I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord.” 

Exodus 10:2

⁹ “I blasted you with blight and mildew. When your gardens increased, Your vineyards, Your fig trees, And your olive trees, The locust devoured them; Yet you have not returned to Me,” Says the Lord. 

Amos 4:9