Joel

 

1  The word of the Lord that came to Joel son of Pethuel.

 An Invasion of Locusts

2 Hear this, you elders;

listen, all who live in the land.

Has anything like this ever happened in your days

or in the days of your forefathers?

 3 Tell it to your children,

and let your children tell it to their children,

and their children to the next generation.

 4 What the locust swarm has left

the great locusts have eaten;

what the great locusts have left

the young locusts have eaten;

what the young locusts have left

other locustsa have eaten.

 5 Wake up, you drunkards, and weep!

Wail, all you drinkers of wine;

wail because of the new wine,

for it has been snatched from your lips.

 6 A nation has invaded my land,

powerful and without number;

it has the teeth of a lion,

the fangs of a lioness.

 7 It has laid waste my vines

and ruined my fig trees.

It has stripped off their bark

and thrown it away,

leaving their branches white.

 8 Mourn like a virginb in sackcloth

grieving for the husbandc of her youth.

 9 Grain offerings and drink offerings

are cut off from the house of the Lord.

The priests are in mourning,

those who minister before the Lord.

 10 The fields are ruined,

the ground is dried upd;

the grain is destroyed,

the new wine is dried up,

the oil fails.

 11 Despair, you farmers,

wail, you vine growers;

grieve for the wheat and the barley,

because the harvest of the field is destroyed.

 12 The vine is dried up

and the fig tree is withered;

the pomegranate, the palm and the apple tree—

all the trees of the field—are dried up.

Surely the joy of mankind

is withered away.

 A Call to Repentance

13 Put on sackcloth, O priests, and mourn;

wail, you who minister before the altar.

Come, spend the night in sackcloth,

you who minister before my God;

for the grain offerings and drink offerings

are withheld from the house of your God.

 14 Declare a holy fast;

call a sacred assembly.

Summon the elders

and all who live in the land

to the house of the Lord your God,

and cry out to the Lord.

 15 Alas for that day!

For the day of the Lord is near;

it will come like destruction from the Almighty.a

 16 Has not the food been cut off

before our very eyes—

joy and gladness

from the house of our God?

 17 The seeds are shriveled

beneath the clods.b

The storehouses are in ruins,

the granaries have been broken down,

for the grain has dried up.

 18 How the cattle moan!

The herds mill about

because they have no pasture;

even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

 19 To you, O Lord, I call,

for fire has devoured the open pastures

and flames have burned up all the trees of the field.

 20 Even the wild animals pant for you;

the streams of water have dried up

and fire has devoured the open pastures.