REMARKS ON THE PROPHECY OF JOEL.
By Uriah Smith
Verse 12. Therefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning; 13; and rend your heart, and not your garments, and 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. 14. Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing behind him; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the Lord your God? In view of the coming of the day of the Lord described in the preceding verses, and the agencies which will come forth in swift and solemn array to execute God’s will, the Lord now turns, through the prophet, to his people with an all-powerful appeal that they will turn unto him. “Turn ye even to me with all the heart.” The day of the Lord is no ordinary day, and the preparation required to meet it is no ordinary preparation. It must be with all the heart. No half-way work will answer. The sense of sin which causes God’s displeasure must be so great, and the work of contrition and repentance so deep, that it will cause fasting and weeping and mourning. The heart must be rent and not the garment. Not that there would be anything improper in rending the garment, if that was a customary way of expressing grief at the time here brought to view. It was customary in Joel’s day; hence it is used as a figure to enforce a lesson for this time. But in those outward forms, a great deal of hypocrisy might be used. Men might cease to anoint their heads, and might put on sackcloth, and appear to fast, when the heart was not in it; so they might rend their garments, and appear to mourn, when their hearts were not affected, and when all they did was to be seen of men. The Lord simply tells them here that the work must be genuine. There must be no hypocrisy here. The heart must be rent. The inducement we have to return is then given; namely, the Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil. If the Lord was not very slow to anger, we should not long see the world going on as it is, its vast volume of aggravating crime, and outbreaking guilt, rolling and surging onward, threatening to engulf all. At some of the doings of multitudes of miscreants that walk the earth in human form, we can hardly refrain from the feelings which the disciples had when they asked the Lord if they should call fire down from heaven to consume them. But the Lord calmly waits; and Peter tells us why. He says it is for the purpose of salvation. 2 Pet. 3:15. He waits till the last soul who will do so, has subscribed to the gracious terms of his salvation. Mercy then ceases to act by limitation, and there is no occasion for longer delay. And the Lord repenteth him of the evil. Will he repent, or turn from his purpose of bringing in the great and terrible day of the Lord? By no means. That is as fixed a fact as the shining of to-morrow’s sun. How then does he repent of the evil? He never repents in the sense of changing the attitude he bears toward sin. But we, by our repentance, change our relation to him. His rule of action is declared in Jer. 18:6-10. When God’s denunciations are out against sin, so long as we continue as a part of the company of sinners we are subjects of the threatened judgments; but when by reformation we put away our wrongs and seek his pardon, in our cases, he repents or turns from the evil which would otherwise have come upon us, and we suffer it not. It is a promise to all who repent. So unwearied is his long-suffering, so great is his mercy. The blessing promised; a meat-offering and a drink-offering unto the Lord your God; that is, such a blessing will be bestowed upon those who seek the Lord in the manner here described, that they will be able to render unto him acceptable worship. In Mal. 3:3, where the refining and purifying work of the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary just before the great day of the Lord is brought to view, we read: “And he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness.” And when this offering in righteousness is presented by his people before the Lord; when they are enabled to offer that worship to him, in which his all-searching eye shall behold no trace of human imperfection; when his people shall throw open the door of their hearts, and bring the Saviour in as a guest, to sup with them, and they with him, Rev. 3:20, then may we look for the windows of heaven to be opened and a blessing poured out that there shall not be room enough to receive it; Mal. 3:10; then may we expect the fulfillment of the promise, “Greater things than these shall he do, because I go to my Father.” John 14:12.