O my soul,
What are those years the locusts have eaten?
I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter …
― Joel 2:25a
Doesn’t this sound like a wonderful promise of restoration? But what does it mean? To understand those years we must first understand the locusts. So what are the locusts? I have quoted only half a verse.
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.
― Joel 2:25
These are the words of the Lord, and so these are his own locusts, his great army, which he sent.
The word of the LORD that came to Joel, the son of Pethuel:
Hear this, you elders; give ear, all inhabitants of the land! Has such a thing happened in your days, or in the days of your fathers? Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children to another generation.
What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten. What the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten, and what the hopping locust left, the destroying locust has eaten.
― Joel 1:1-4
Whatever is going on here clearly was and is of vital importance and must be remembered. Notice the urgent exhortation to pay attention, to tell the children and the children’s children, not to forget even through the generations. We ourselves must not overlook this. It is as relevant today as it was then.
We learn more from Zephaniah.
“I will utterly sweep away everything from the face of the earth,” declares the LORD. “I will sweep away man and beast; I will sweep away the birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea, and the rubble with the wicked. I will cut off mankind from the face of the earth,” declares the LORD.
― Zephaniah 1:2-3
Who are these wicked ones who have brought down such judgment from the Lord?
“I will stretch out my hand against Judah and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem”
― Zephaniah 1:4a
These are the Lord’s chosen people, the hitherto recipients of his covenant love. And this is a prophecy of the day of the Lord, that terrible day of judgment and destruction rained down by the Lord on his own people, his beloved ones.
But why? Why would this happen?
“I will punish the officials and the king’s sons and all who array themselves in foreign attire.”
― Zephaniah 1:8
The Lord’s people, his highest and most exalted ones, had become so compromised, so contaminated by the nations. So worldly. So like us in fact.
“At that time I will search Jerusalem with lamps, and I will punish the men who are complacent, those who say in their hearts, ‘The LORD will not do good, nor will he do ill.’”
― Zephaniah 1:12
O my soul, do you think this couldn’t happen to us? Isn’t that thought the very definition of complacency? That the Lord will not do good, nor will he do ill? That everything will just continue to tick along as we all go about our lives? That the extent of the Lord’s interest is merely to observe? O my soul, repudiate such thinking. Purge that complacency.
What then should be done in the face of this day of judgment?
Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near.
― Zephaniah 1:7a
Are you so full of bluster? So full of excuses? So full of self-justification? Be silent! Be silent before the Lord God!
And then what?
Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands; seek righteousness; seek humility; perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the LORD.
― Zephaniah 2:3
We must be silent and humble ourselves and seek righteousness and humility. But where may these be found in the midst of all this negligence and self-indulgence and intransigence?
John tells us of the first.
My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
― 1 John 2:1-2
And Paul tells us of the second.
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
― Philippians 2:5-8
Seek righteousness and humility. Seek Jesus. Cry out to him for salvation and turn to him so that you may be hidden on that terrible day of the Lord.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
― Colossians 3:3
Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.
― Hebrews 12:28-29
Let us repent of complacency and brainless triumphalism, and offer to God acceptable worship with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.
But there’s something else to notice here.
Be silent before the Lord GOD! For the day of the LORD is near; the LORD has prepared a sacrifice and consecrated his guests.
― Zephaniah 1:7
The Lord has indeed prepared a sacrifice.
And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.”
― Genesis 22:7-8
For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
― Hebrews 9:24-26
Not only has the Lord prepared the sacrifice of his only Son at such enormous cost, but through him he has also consecrated his guests. O my soul, your own consecration is ongoing, as you are so very aware. Rejoice that it continues and exult with all your heart at the lavish generosity of this restoration.
Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your heart, O daughter of Jerusalem! The LORD has taken away the judgments against you; he has cleared away your enemies.
― Zephaniah 3:14-15
And observe how the Lord himself rejoices to see his people returning to him in repentance and humility.
The LORD your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.
― Zephaniah 3:17
O my soul, be quieted by that great Calvary love, rejoice and give thanks to the one who restores those years! 🙏