"Tear Your Hearts" June 18 Readings: Joel 1-3

 

Reading the Bible Chronologically in 2024

This year, instead of reading from Genesis to Revelation, we will read the Bible as the story flows, as it happened and was written. There are several plans out there and I have worked to combine them into a plan that lets the Bible tell its own story "as it happened." Remember, the Bible is inspired, but not in the order the books appear in our Bibles.  The Old Testament is approximately 3/4 of the Bible, but we will give more emphasis to the New Testament, spending half the year in the Old Testament and half in the New. 

Bible Readings: Joel 1-3

Background:  

Joel is a mystery prophet, with almost no specific historical information to date it. Some put it among the earliest of the prophets and many place Joel at the end of the kingdom of Judah and as a contemporary of Jeremiah and Ezekiel.

Daily Devotional: Test Your Hearts

Joel tells the entire story of sin and redemption, a microcosm of Israel's history, of God's grace and restoration toward them. In chapter 1, Joel calls Israel to task for their sin and explains the consequences of that sin. Israel was suffering greatly, and they often wondered why. They thought that since they were the chosen people of God that he should shield them from trouble.

But God was allowing them to suffer the consequences of their wicked sin.

Tell your children about it in the years to come,
    and let your children tell their children.
    Pass the story down from generation to generation.
4 After the cutting locusts finished eating the crops,
    the swarming locusts took what was left!
After them came the hopping locusts,
and then the stripping locusts, too! Joel 1:3-4

Sin is not only an offense to God, but it destroys us. Like waves of locusts, it destroys the life that God has intended for us. Israel thought that they could embrace sin, idolatry, immorality, greed, and other sins and still experience the blessing of God and the joys of his presence. But sin doesn't work like that. It devastates and destroys. 

But there is a solution to sin. God opens his heart to repentant sinners. 

That is why the Lord says,
“Turn to me now, while there is time.
Give me your hearts.
Come with fasting, weeping, and mourning.
13 Don’t tear your clothing in your grief,
but tear your hearts instead.”
Return to the Lord your God,
for he is merciful and compassionate,
slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.
He is eager to relent and not punish. Joel 2:12-13

What a powerful statement. "Tear your hearts, not just your clothes." Real repentance - a heart of sorrow over sin, one that turns to God with a full, pure, and humble heart. Our great blessing is that God is not hard-hearted or vindictive. He responds to repentant sinners with grace. In fact, he initiates grace by seeking us in his love. He is faithful and good, always seeking reconciliation rather than judgment. 

Verse 19  tells us the end result of Israel's repentance (and ours). 

“Look! I am sending you grain and new wine and olive oil,
enough to satisfy your needs.
You will no longer be an object of mockery
among the surrounding nations. Joel 2:19

He restores the repentant. 

It is my desire to walk consistently with God - when I consider what Christ has done for me, what else can I do? But I have more than 50 years of history as a Christian and I know who I am. Like Israel, I wander. I fail. I sin. And knowing who I am and what I do, it is a great comfort to know that the God who made me, the God who saved me, is a God who loves me, who is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, rich in faithful love. I wish that I did not presume on that grace as often as I do, but I am thankful that my God is love, that the Blood of his Son is forever powerful against sin, and that he never abandons me, even in my depths. 

Thank you, Father, for your amazing Grace. Thank you for the Blood of your Son that cleanses and restores me. 

 

Consider God's Word:

Is there sin you need to confess to God today?
Thank God for his faithful love and grace.