The reader of Joel's prophecy is not left wondering what the theme is. Judgment is painted in vivid colors on almost every page. The book begins with God's judgment, his judgment upon the people who are called by his name, his own special people who he had freed from slavery in Egypt and had brought into the land of promise, his own people. who were called by his name and who were to be an example to the nations round about them as to what it meant to live in the favour of God and live for the glory of God. But they had failed in their commission. They had taken on board the values of the people around them and of the nations that had been purged from the land that they had inherited. Instead of devoting themselves to the worship of the Lord God, they had given themselves to the worship of idols. Instead of keeping themselves holy in his presence, they had adulterated themselves with the gods of other nations. And God did not turn a blind eye to what was going on in Israel. And he sent a judgment upon them to wake them up from their complacency, to wake them up from their sleep, to stir them to consider their sin, and to return to God in repentance. We observed that the devastation that had been caused by that judgment, a judgment of locusts and drought, the locusts had ravaged the land, eating up every green thing, and the drought had caused the renewal to be delayed. And so, the people were called to repent. And the people did repent, and God responded to their calls for mercy and their cries of repentance. And the devastation that had been caused by the locusts, a warning of further judgment to come, both in scope and in duration, that devastation was reversed. The mercy of God was poured out upon these people, for they called to Him in sorrow, They cried to him in repentance, and the blessings that followed the judgment were greater than those that had preceded it. And the land once again flowed with milk and honey. Once again, their crops were lush, and their herds and their flocks were fruitful. But we observed in the earlier chapter of the book of Joel that this prophecy was not for a time and a place only, it was for all history and for all peoples. There is an encouragement in this prophecy that all from whichever nation and whichever language who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. These were words that were picked up by the Apostle Peter on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit was poured out upon that infant church. And this multitude who were gathered from the nations in Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover and Pentecost suddenly heard good news being proclaimed in the languages that they had adopted in far-flung places. The gospel had come, the gospel of salvation through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, for the Deliverer had come into this world to save his people from their sins. And so the apostles proclaimed this message, not to Jews alone, but to Gentiles also. And the word spread swiftly through the Roman Empire into its far reaches, so that people from many languages and nations began to call upon the name of the Lord. And he was true to his promise, and he rejected none who in humility bowed themselves in repentance towards him and cried out for mercy. and so gathered in to the kingdom of Jesus Christ, a people from all sorts of backgrounds and all sorts of places. And down through the ages of history, this same message has been proclaimed all around the world. And so it is today that we are gathered together here by the grace of God. to hear his word once again and to heed his warnings once again for over and over and over again there is this temptation of the evil one that we should rest upon past blessings and put our confidence in the Lord's unwavering kindness and think that he will overlook our sins and our shortcomings and that we may pursue our lives for the comforts of this world rather than pursuing them for the glory of God. The prophecy of Joel has rich relevance for all people in all places at all times. And in this third chapter, Joel reinforces what he has hinted at previously, that there is a day of the Lord dawning, a day in which the Lord's will will come to pass. The day in which what he desires will ultimately and climactically come to pass. He will have his way. And Joel now in this third chapter, having considered the first advent of the promised Messiah at the end of chapter two, now looks beyond that first advent to the second advent. The first advent would see the outpouring of the Spirit of God, turning the hearts of men and women and boys and girls in repentance to God, that they might be saved from their sins. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Anointed One, having paid the price for the sins of his people in his death upon the cross. But those words at the end of chapter 2, are words that truncate the period of time between the first and the second advents of Jesus Christ, so that they tell of things that will happen with the outpouring of the Spirit at the beginning of this age, and they tell of things that will come at the end of the age, when the sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And so in chapter three, Joel turns his attention to that time, when the day of the Lord will dawn, when he will come again in judgment upon this world. The day of the Lord is God's day of judgment. And Joel describes that in the first eight verses of chapter three. He speaks about the scope of God's judgment of this world. He says that God will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat was a king of Judah in a time of peace and then in a time of turmoil. His name means God will judge or God will decide. And there were certain judgments that were made during the reign of King Jehoshaphat to which this term may be referring. On the other hand, it may simply be drawing on the meaning of his name. that this is the valley of decision, as it is set in verse 14. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision. Here is the valley of judgment. Here is the valley in which God will declare his judgment upon the nations. For God is the God of creation. He is the God who brought all things into being. He is the God of Babel, who thrusts out the peoples from that one place in their rebellion against God, confusing their languages and scattering them abroad, creating the nations that populate this world. God is the God of all peoples then. He is sovereign over all, even though not all acknowledge His sovereignty or bow to it. Every person is accountable to him. Every nation and every king and potentate is accountable to him. And everyone must at the last day come before him and give an account of the way that their lives have been lived and their nations have been governed. But beyond that, the light of God shines upon the nations of the world in the gospel. Those from every tongue, those from every language, those from every nation, those from every people will hear the gospel and respond to the gospel and be brought into the kingdom of Christ. But not every individual of every tongue, not every person of every nation, Not everyone among every people will respond with faith and will humble themselves in repentance and cry to the Lord for mercy. Many will continue in darkness, fleeing from the light because they love the darkness for their deeds are evil. Many will close their ears to the invitation and call of the gospel to humble themselves in repentance and find hope and salvation in Jesus Christ. Many will consider it foolishness. Others will find it too much of a stumbling block, and they will turn away from it. And all then will have the opportunity to hear and to respond from every nation of the world. There will be an ingathering of the people, and yet there will also be the rejection of the people. They must be judged. The gospel that touches every nations will stand in accusation against the nations of this world. That is the scope of God's judgment. All nations, all peoples, all languages, they will all come before him on that day. And the basis for God's judgment In Joel's view of his current situation, the basis of God's judgment will be their mistreatment of his people, their rejection of the ways of his people, the culture of his people, the priorities of his people, and ultimately the God of his people. It will be ultimately a rejection of God, by way of the mistreatment of his people. And Joel relates it in these terms. Why are they to be judged? They're to be judged on behalf of my people, says God, and my heritage, Israel, because they have scattered them among the nations and have divided up my land and have cast lots for my people and have traded a boy for a prostitute and have sold a girl for wine and have drunk it. They've mistreated the people of God, rejecting the God of the people. Luke tells us that those who reject, who are rejected as Christ's people, it isn't they who are rejected ultimately, it is Jesus who is rejected. And then beyond that, it is the God who has sent Jesus into this world. And Paul expands upon that in his letter to the Romans when he says that the people will deny God and they will turn to creation and worship it instead. All that God has displayed of himself in the created order will become the object of their worship of them rather than the God who created it. And this rejection of God's people and their rejection of God himself is the basis then for God's judgment of the nations. What are you to me, God says through Joel, O Tyre and Sidon? What are you to me, O Philistia? Are you paying me back for something? Is there something I've done to you that you should treat my people this way? I will pay you back, God says, for the way that you're treating my people. And so God's judgment will come upon Tyre and Sidon, upon Philistia, and beyond that, upon all the nations of the world who reject God and reject his people. And then Joel describes the nature of God's judgment. God, you see, is a true and righteous judge. He doesn't simply retaliate in any way. He doesn't just simply show his power in any form, but the punishment always fits the crime. God is always just and righteous in his judgments. And so, Joel describes the judgment in terms that resemble what the nations had done to the people of God. They had scattered them abroad among the nations, they had divided up the land, they had cast lots for the people, they had sold them into slavery. and God says that their judgment will that they too will be divided and scattered and sold. John, picking up on the imagery that we have frequently in the Old Testament prophets in the book of Revelation, describes the judgment of God upon the nations and he describes it in terms of of a judgment that is according to one's works. Of course, that isn't unique to John. Jesus himself spoke in those terms. It is a common refrain through the scriptures that those who are judged will be judged according to their works. And this is the judgment then that will befall the nations, a judgment that they cannot escape from, a judgment that is based upon their rejection of God, a judgment that will be fitting to the crime that they have committed in rejecting their creator and not living for his glory. The day of the Lord is the day of God's judgment. But this judgment is set before us in various ways in verses 9 through 16. And it displays to us that the day of the Lord is a day of God's triumph. The nations are called to judgment. They are summoned to judgment. It isn't something that they somehow fall into. It isn't something that overtakes them. It is something that is deliberate. There is a set time. There is an appointed day and an appointed hour. Again, this is a refrain that we find through the prophets and through the New Testament, that things are done according to the purpose of God. At the right time, he acts in a particular way. And so it will be with the judgment. The call to judgment is given like a call to war. He says, proclaim this among the nations. Consecrate for war. Stir up the mighty men. Let all the men of war draw near. Let them come up. Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning hooks into spears. Let the weak say, I'm a warrior. God calls the people to come against him. if they may, to come with their weapons, to come with their armies, to come strong, mighty warrior, and the weak one who imagines himself a mighty warrior, to come against the Lord in this day of judgment. After all, this is what the enemies of God have been doing all along. They've been warring against him. How will it be any different on the day of judgment? But there's mockery in this call. There's no realistic possibility that the enemies of God are going to win, that they are somehow going to reverse the odds at the judgment and come up the winners, triumphant over God. How ridiculous this is. For even the mighty men are weaklings in the face of God. As they stand before him, they are nothing. They are but the dust of the earth in his sight. Indeed, they are dust, for from it he made them, and to it he will return them. And their souls will be judged and punished forever. They've already lost the battle. There is no chance of victory for them now. Not only are they called in this way to hasten and come from the nations and gather themselves as warriors against the Lord, but they're also described as being a harvest, a harvest in which God himself will put in the sickle and reap it. And it is the reaper who decides when the harvest will be gathered in. when the fields are ripe, when they're ready. It's the picture that John uses again in the book of Revelation, where in chapter 14, in the closing verses of that chapter, he graphically portrays the judgment of the world as a field that is ready for harvest and the sickle is put through it and it's gathered in, or a vineyard. where the grapes are all ripe and they are plucked off the vine and set in the winepress and trampled there. Here is the language used by Joel, put in the sickle for the harvest is ripe, go in, tread, for the winepress is full, the vats overflow, for their evil is great. It's a call to war that cannot be won by the enemies of God. It is call for a harvest to be gathered in and the grapes to be pressed in judgment. And then finally, this day of triumph is pictured as a day of judgment. a day of decision. Multitudes, he says, multitudes in the valley of decision. For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. The sun and the moon are darkened and the stars withdraw their shining. Here is the day at the end of the age, at the end of the world, that no one can escape. And here are the multitudes, multitude upon multitude, gathered together into this valley of decision. Not a gathering in for them to make a decision. One last opportunity. For whom will they live? Whom will they serve? No, this isn't their decision that is to be made on this occasion. This is the decision of God. This is the judgment of God. This is the day that Jesus depicted as a farmer who gathers his sheep and his goats, and he sets the one on his left hand and the other on his right. A great division is made, a great separation is made between those who have called out to him for mercy, who have trusted in his grace, and who have found salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ. and those who have rejected him and resisted him and pursued their own wisdom in their own ways. Here is God's decision about to be disclosed. Here is his verdict upon each man, each woman, each boy, each girl. Sentence will be passed. And those who have not come to God before this day will be banished from Him forever. But those who repented before, those who turned before, they will be protected. They will be covered. They will be shielded. The Lord roars from Zion and utters his voice from Jerusalem and the heavens and the earthquake, but the Lord is a refuge to his people, a stronghold to the people of Israel. On that great day, that awesome day of the Lord, the people of the world will cry out to the mountains to fall upon them and bury them. They would wish that the earth would quake and open up and swallow them and hide them from the living God before whom they must stand. But those who are trusting in Jesus, God's anointed savior, those who have humbled themselves before him and cried out for mercy, those who have acknowledged their sins and their deserving of judgment, will be spared on that day. For the Lord is their refuge, He is their stronghold, He gathers them in, and He is their defender. He brings them to Himself, and He will intercede for them. He will be their advocate on that great and awesome day of judgment, the day of God's triumph over evil. when all will be made new and glorious for the people who have trusted in him, and all will be horror and judgment for those who have resisted him. It is a day to be contemplated. It is a day to be considered. Don't shut your mind to it. Don't think, oh, well, that day is so far off. How do you know it's so far off? How do you know that that day will not dawn tomorrow? As the sun rises over this nation, perhaps the trumpet of the Lord will sound. How do you know that that will not be so? Are you ready for that day? Don't put that day off. The day of your judgment the day of your reckoning when you look in upon yourself and you look at yourself with all seriousness and with all honesty and you say, have I loved the Lord my God with all my heart and soul and mind and strength? And have I loved my neighbour as myself? Have I done God's will in my life and lived for his glory? This is the day that you must face. a day of your own personal judgment and come before God and cry out to him for mercy. And say to him, I have not loved you, you know that. I have not loved my neighbor, you know that. I haven't lived for your service, I haven't lived for your glory, you know all of that. But have mercy, have mercy today. Save today, change my heart. Turn my mind so that it doesn't cling to the things of this world, but it clings to Christ. Make me a new creation in Christ Jesus. Cry to him for mercy today. For those who know the mercy of God will know the salvation of God in the day of judgment. when he will speak on behalf of those who have cried out to him in repentance. And so he says, you shall know that I am the Lord your God who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain. In that day, oh, there will be such richness, there will be such peace, there will be such plenty. The mountains shall drip sweet wine and the hills shall flow with milk and all the streambeds of Judah shall flow with water. There will be a return to the paradise that had been lost through the rebellion of wicked men. God had said through Joel in chapter two and in verse three, as he pictures the judgment of God that would come upon them, fire devours before these armies 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. But God, for his people, will plant a new garden that will flourish and be fruitful. He will create a new creation in which righteousness dwells and no wicked thing will find a place. For Egypt shall become a desolation, Edom a desolate wilderness. All that was violent, all that was rebellious will be destroyed, will be as nothing. But Judah, the people of God, they'll inhabit the new Jerusalem forever and ever and ever. They will know the mercy of God in all of its richness. They will know the glory of God in all of its depth. Joel describes a restoration of paradise, words that are echoed by John in Revelation chapter 21, when God promises to make all things new for his people. The enemies of God will be utterly destroyed, but the people of God, oh, they will be so blessed. And how is this possible? It is, as Joel says, because the Lord dwells in Zion. In other words, he sits on the throne of eternity. He is in command of all things. There is nothing greater than he, nothing more powerful than he. Nothing can stand against him and his purposes. No one can thwart him. or prevent him from doing his will. And he has spoken, and his word is yes and amen. He will perform it. And Christ, his own Son, has come and offered an acceptable sacrifice for the sins of his people, so that they may be saved. The nations will stand before God and you will be there. In that valley of decision, you will be there. What will God's verdict be concerning your life and your destiny? Will you be one of those who are gathered to him because you repented of your sins? You have the robe of Christ's righteousness covering you as an acceptable garment to God. You'll be drawn into his kingdom forever and ever. Or will you be one of those who continues unrepentant Will you be one of those upon whom God's looks with wrath? Because you've heard the gospel and you've refused it. You've heard the good news of Jesus Christ, his Son, the Saviour, and you've rejected him. The day of judgement is coming, it cannot be escaped. But today is a day of grace. Today is a day of salvation. Today the command is given, repent, believe, turn, cry out, ask for mercy. Today things can be different for you. What will you do today. Let's pray. Our Father, we know that your day is coming. A day of judgment, a day of triumph, a day of grace for your people, a day of horror for those who have refused. But today is a day of salvation. Today, the command goes forth. Today, mercy is offered. Be pleased to open ears and hearts, to hear and respond to the call that repentant souls might be saved, even today. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.