Joel 1:14
“Sanctify you a fast, call a solemn assembly, gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land into the house of the LORD your God, and cry to the LORD”
The plague of locusts that had so devastated Israel’s crops, carried an important lesson. Sin is not just an individual matter--it's a corporate one as well. Therefore, the nation was feeling the divine discipline of God.
In our text we see the prophet Joel calling on God’s people to; fast, gather together, cry unto the Lord with tears of repentance and seek God’s forgiveness for their sin as a nation.
America is in the same boat, a nation in need of repentance. We are so far from our Christian Roots that I shutter to think of the judgment we have in store for us at the end of His grace and mercy unless, we “cry to the Lord”, repent and turn from our present course.
Although the Lord is longsuffering towards us (and not willing that any should perish but, that all should come to repentance 2 Peter 3:9) there will come a time when He will no longer hold back His divine judgment.
The Truth
“Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; Let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him; and to our God who will abundantly pardon.” (Isaiah 55:6-7)
