Joel 2:12-14 English Standard Version

Return to the Lord

12 “Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning;

13 and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love; and he relents over disaster.

14 Who knows whether he will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind him, a grain offering and a drink offering for the Lord your God?

The opening verses of Joel 2 are titled “The Day of the Lord”. We can read those words for ourselves but I have to ask this of our God, “yet even now”, is it true for us today?

If it is a way to avoid that which is written about the Day of the Lord, is it nationalistic in nature or just personal?

As a people of God we have our concerns over those we love and we would prefer to avoid such calamities that are avoidable. Our concerns are both individual and national. Perhaps nationalistic concerns are too narrow. We are not as aware of things in areas of the world nearly as much as we are about things at home.

Over the years there have been many calls to repentance that have gone out abroad and have been answered only in some small portion. Nothing has touched our people on such a broad enough scale as to say that a nation is in mourning over their sins.

Will He relent for the sake of fifty good men? If not fifty, then forty, or thirty? Will you relent for the sake of even ten?

Is this our Lot lesson? Will we flee and escape only with our family?

We pray O Lord, what would you have us do?

Isaiah 20 English Standard Version

A Sign Against Egypt and Cush

20 In the year that the commander in chief, who was sent by Sargon the king of Assyria, came to Ashdod and fought against it and captured it— 2 at that time the Lord spoke by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, “Go, and loose the sackcloth from your waist and take off your sandals from your feet,” and he did so, walking naked and barefoot.

3 Then the Lord said, “As my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and a portent against Egypt and Cush,[Nubia] 4 so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptian captives and the Cushite exiles, both the young and the old, naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered, the nakedness of Egypt. 5 Then they shall be dismayed and ashamed because of Cush their hope and of Egypt their boast. 6 And the inhabitants of this coastland will say in that day, ‘Behold, this is what has happened to those in whom we hoped and to whom we fled for help to be delivered from the king of Assyria! And we, how shall we escape?’”

This is the whole of chapter 20 in Isaiah’s book. It is a sign for the people of Egypt and Nubia.

It is in their history. It is an ancient artifact that can be traced to a time and a place and names of historical figures. 

This is not my history and it holds no meaning for me. It is not in my history. It is a sign for others.

What can we take from such a short message that was not even meant for us?

We are servants of the One True God. Isaiah walked naked and barefoot for three years at God’s direction for a people who were not even his people.

There is no doubt or anxiety expressed by Isaiah, just raw obedience.

I will think about this as I go about my day whining about my own place in history.

I am blessed that God has not called me to do something so radical as what Isaiah did.

But my life is not over, and my faith has only been lightly tested.

So far.