CRITICAL NOTES.]
Joel 1:13.] A summons to repentance. Priests] first; they have been negligent, and must set the example of penitence. Sackcloth] Outward garments must indicate inward grief (Isaiah 32:11; Jeremiah 4:8).
Joel 1:14. Sanctify] Set apart, hallow days of fasting. Solemn assem.] Lit. proclaim a restraint, i.e. let young and old cease manual labour to fast and pray (2 Chronicles 20:3-13). Elders] in office and age. Cry] Not a mere formal fast, but intense and earnest prayer for mercy and help.
MINISTERS OF THE SANCTUARY AN EXAMPLE OF PENITENCE AND PIETY IN THE DAY OF CALAMITY.—Joel 1:13-14
The fourth call is to priests of the temple, who are first to humble themselves in private as a preparation for public confession. A fast must be appointed, and they must lead the princes and people in solemn prayer before Almighty God. When judgment begins at the house of God, penitence should begin also, for priests are often the first and greatest cause of sorrow.
I. They must mourn for sin. “Lament” and howl. In all true penitence there will be a due sense of guilt. Physical evil may cause sorrow, the destruction of vegetation and vineyards may create lamentation; but moral evil compels us to feel guilty; and justice cries for punishment.
1. Mourn in sackcloth. “Gird yourselves.” Outward garments are of no avail without inward contrition. We must rend our hearts, not our garments. Yet by outward acts we must incite others, testify our abject condition before God, and renounce all carnal customs and delights. “For this gird you with sackcloth, lament and howl; for the fierce anger of the Lord is not turned back from us.”
2. Mourn continually. “Come, lie all night in sackcloth.” Day and night was the temple service. So there must not be occasional grief, but lamentation without intermission. Guilt often disturbs the sleep of night, and men lie not at ease, but in sorrow. Instead of going to rest and employing the night in Psalmody, many have more reason to confess their sins and deprecate the wrath of God. “All the night make I my bed to swim: I water my couch with tears.”
3. Mourn with others. All classes, the princes, and elders, and all the people, were to mourn universally. Chiefs in authority, and elders in sanctity and grey hairs, were to form one band and lament with one heart and voice. The example of old men must stimulate the young to repentance; and the authority of priests must urge others to the fear and worship of God. All had contributed to national guilt, all were equally exposed, and all must join together in national humiliation. The more public and prevalent, the more pleasing and acceptable to God is national sorrow. “Then all the children of Israel, and all the people, went up, and came unto the house of God and wept, and sat there before the Lord” (Judges 20:26; 2 Chronicles 30:3; Jonah 3:5; Jonah 3:7-8).
II. They must sanctify a fast. “Sanctify ye a fast.”
1. Universal cessation from labour. The day must be fixed, set apart and solemnly observed. “Proclaim a restraint,” let manual labour cease, and hallow the fast with acts of devotion and fruits meet for repentance. No servile work must be done, the time must be consecrated, like the Sabbath, not to eating, and drinking, and seeking pleasure, but to supplication and obedience.
2. Universal worship. The elders and all the inhabitants were to assemble in the house of God. England did well to observe a day of thanksgiving for the restoration of the Prince of Wales. What a spectacle to continental nations! Fasting without devotion was only a form of sorrow. Festive joys must give place to religious worship. Fasting must be connected with the mortification of the flesh, the contrition of the spirit, and humiliation in the house of God. Here all were commanded to repair to confess their guilt and obey their laws. The house of God is the house of prayer; the place in which he has put his name, and the centre of Divine influence and Christian friendship. Here the world loses its charms, trials are forgotten, the mind is elevated, and sympathies “meet and mingle into bliss.” “I have hallowed this house, which thou hast built, to put my name there for ever; and mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually” (1 Kings 9:3). “What prayer and supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, in this house. Then hear thou in heaven thy dwelling-place” (1 Kings 8:38; 2 Chronicles 6:33).
3. Universal supplication. “And cry unto the Lord.” (a) Supplication must be united. All must not merely be present, but all must join together in prayer. Attendance must be devout, the time must be spent before God, not in gazing at men. United prayer has power with God and influence upon men. It is thus that heaven is taken by violence and national calamities averted. (b) Supplication must be earnest. “Cry unto the Lord.” It is not a listless, irreverent prayer, but a loud earnest cry. No formal customary supplication will suffice; the distress is great, the routine of life and worship must be disregarded, and the “cry” must be with impassioned earnestness and repetition. Cold prayers are a mockery and never climb to heaven. “So long as the light shines bright and the fires of devotion and desires flame out,” says Jeremy Taylor, “so long the mind of a man stands close to the altar and waits upon the sacrifice; but as the fires die and desires decay, so the mind steals away and walks abroad.” We are taken from the fields to the sanctuary in this picture. A train of priests, clothed in sackcloth and worn with vigils, stand between the porch and the altar, weeping and making supplication to God; a large assembly, led by the elders, gather round them, bend their heads in passionate grief, and unite in earnest cry for mercy and deliverance. Priest and peasant, kings and princes, old and young, bow in confession, petition, and humiliation before their Maker, and thus own their dependence and set an example to others. “Let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O Lord.”
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 1
Joel 1:13-14. Ministers. A country parson fighting against the devil in his parish has nobler ideas than Alexander had [Adam]. Example works more than precept; for words without practice are but counsels without effect. But when we do as we say, we illustrate and confirm the rule which we prescribe. “Men believe more by the eyes than by the ears,” says Seneca.