Richard Foster repeats an old Jewish story about a little boy who went to a prophet and said, “Prophet, don’t you see? You have been prophesying now for fifteen years and things are still the same. Why do you keep on?” And the prophet said, “Don’t you know little boy, I’m not prophesying to change the world but to prevent the world from changing me.”
Perhaps the prophet Joel wrote so that he wouldn’t be changed by the world. But he also wrote for people he would never see: How could he have known that at Pentecost in the first and greatest sermon of the church, Peter, led by the Spirit would choose his words as the text of the message, or that Paul writing to the Romans pleading with them for salvation would say, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” We owe a debt to Joel because his words are timeless. He wrote not only to keep the world from changing him, but because he believed that someday, somehow, some way God would use his words to change the lives of people. Now is that time. We are those people.
First, we see that God restores. Listen to his promise, “I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten.” The locust not only took away the food but they took away the years of labor. But God who is the controller of time is able to give back the years! Chuck Swindoll tells in his “Quest for Character, how by His sovereign grace, God can bring good out of our failures, and even out of our sins. J. Stuart Holden tells of an old Scottish mansion close to where he had his little summer home. The walls of one room were filled with sketches made by distinguished artists. The practice began after a pitcher of soda water was accidentally spilled on a freshly decorated wall and left an unsightly stain. At the time, a noted artist, Lord Landseer, was a guest in the house. One day when the family went out to the moors, he stayed behind. With a few masterful strokes of a piece of charcoal, that ugly spot became the outline of a beautiful waterfall, bordered by trees and wildlife. He turned that disfigured wall into one of his most successful depictions of Highland life.
Second, God revives his people by his Holy Spirit. Listen to his promise: “I will pour out my Spirit on all people.” Peter chose these verses as his text for his great sermon at Pentecost. Jesus’ life inaugurated the last days. The Spirit’s arrival at Pentecost fulfilled Joel’s prophecy. To this day God empowers our sons and daughters by his Spirit to dream dreams, see visions, and proclaim his word.
Whatever else happened at Pentecost, the church was born and lives were changed as 3000 called on the name of the Lord. We still speak his word knowing that even if some in our world do not change, our world will not change us.
