- “Yet even now,” declares the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; 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. Joel 2:12-13 – Joel is pleading with his audience to turn from their sin and return back to a holy worship of the Lord. Yet the type of repentance that the Lord was seeking was not simply an outward display of repentance, but a deep repentance that was true. We see this with that short phrase of “rend your hearts and not your garments.” Rending means to tear something, and in their day when one was truly in distress over something they would tear their clothes as an outward demonstration of their grief and sorrow. What the Lord didn’t want was His people to just give an outward demonstration of their grief over their sin. Outward displays could be faked while never actually planning to change their ways with sin. God wasn’t asking for outward displays of repentance, God was asking for real repentance. God wanted a rending, a tearing, of their hearts. In our story know God isn’t looking for superficial apologizes from us over our sin, yet at the same time having no plans to change our habits with sin. God wants real repentance from us, where we are returning to Him with all we have and crucifying our sin to the cross to never pick it up again. God isn’t looking for words of apology, God is looking for a heart that is broken over their sin and that is approaching Him for its mending. How have you then been handling sin lately, would it look more like a rending of your heart or just your garments? I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 3287
- And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the Lord has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the Lord calls. (v.32) This has a familiar start to the passage doesn’t it? We see here in Joel where Paul was referring back to when writing the book of Romans. For us who are in a relationship with Christ, this familiar message in Joel means everything. Anyone that calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Among those who make it are those whom the Lord cried out to and who responded to His call. Have you ever pondered why you though? Why would God offer His love and hand out to you and allow you to carry the title of “survivor?” First understand the reason why is He loves you. He did all that He did to just be with you. What comes next is our response to that massive love. How are we going to celebrate our survival and new life? By inviting others into this new life should be our answer. Sadly enough though, too often Christians will celebrate their survival and new life by making no change at all to their life. There has to be a point in your story where you realize the blessing you’ve been given with this new life and start thanking God for it with your life. Never sharing His name, never using your gifts, never stepping up, that’s what everyone else is doing. We’ve been saved. We’re not like everyone else. Use this new life you’ve been blessed with to make Him known and to show others that they can be saved to. – Daily DEVO 40
- Like warriors they charge; like soldiers they scale the wall. They march each on his way; they do not swerve from their paths. They do not jostle one another; each marches in his path; they burst through the weapons and are not halted. Joel 2:7-8 – If this was being said of God’s people, what an encouragement it would be. Fighting like mighty warriors, not swerving to the left or to the right, not being halted by the enemies weapons. Yet this wasn’t being said of God’s people but of the invaders that were to come against Israel due to their sinfulness. God’s hope though for Israel, and His hope for us is that we’ll be like this. Steadfast in our mission, not causing our brother next to us to get out of line. Not letting obstacles or attacks halt us but pressing through. Let’s challenge ourselves to be more like the warriors spoken about within this passage for God. Steadfast, focused, unstoppable. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 1190
- Fire devours before them, and behind them a flame burns. The land is like the garden of Eden before them, but behind them a desolate wilderness, and nothing escapes them. Joel 2:3 – This is a picture for us today as to what our sin can cause in our story. It can take something beautiful and leave it a wasteland. In our passage God is seeking to show them what their land in going to look like once His wrath is poured out on their sinfulness. He is using the locust invasion to give them a visual idea of what sort of devastation is going to be coming their way when this invading army steps on the scene. What was once beautiful will now be a wilderness. What was once full of life will just be filled with death. Church, please hear this is still the end result of our sin if we don’t repent and give our sin over to God. If we kept choosing sin after we’ve been directed by God to let it go, we’re going to start seeing a wasteland created in our story. We’re going to see our story empty of solid relationships, lacking joy, and a dryness to our life due to our lack of an intimate walk with Jesus. A garden of Eden beauty is possible in our story, but when we choose sin we are choosing a wasteland over Eden. What sin then have we been refusing to turn from? Today needs to be different than yesterday when it comes to your sin. God’s inviting you into a beautiful life with Him, but sin has to be let go of. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2075
Daily DEVO 