And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the LORD shall be delivered: for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the LORD hath said, and in the remnant whom the LORD shall call.
Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord - Hebrew, Yahweh (H3068). Applied to Jesus in Romans 10:13 (cf. Acts 9:14; 1 Corinthians 1:2). Therefore, Jesus is Yahweh; and the phrase means, 'Call on Messiah in his divine attributes.'
Shall be delivered - as the Christians were, just before Jerusalem's destruction, by retiring to Pella, having been warned by the Saviour (Matthew 24:16); a type, of the spiritual deliverance of all believers, and of the last deliverance of the elect "remnant" of Israel from the final assault of Antichrist.
For in mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance. "In Zion and Jerusalem" the Saviour first appeared; and there again shall He appear as the Deliverer (Zechariah 14:1-5).
As the Lord hath said. Joel herein refers, not to the other prophets, but to his own words preceding.
And in the remnant whom the Lord shall call. Metaphor from an invitation to a feast, which is an act of gratuitous kindness (Luke 14:16, "A certain man made a supper, and bade many"). So the remnant called and saved is according to the election of grace, not for man's merits, power, or efforts (Romans 11:5). 'To Joel was revealed that great paradox or mystery of faith, that while deliverance should be in Zion, while sons and daughters, young and old, should prophesy in Zion, and the stream of God's grace should issue to the barren world from the Temple of the Lord, those in her who should be delivered should be "a remnant" only. To Joel first it was foreshown that the Gentiles too should be filled with the Spirit of God' (Pusey).
Remarks:
(1) The coming of the day of the Lord is a consideration which may well "alarm" the careless and unprepared (Joel 2:1). To them it is indeed "a day of darkness, gloominess, clouds, and thick darkness" (Joel 2:2).
(2) Each successive day of visitation for sin has had its own distinctive character, so that no former visitation has been altogether like it. Thus Babylon was characterized by extraordinary pride; Medo-Persia by cruelty; Antiochus Epiphanes, under the third world-kingdom, by blasphemy and persecution of God's people; and Rome, in its final anti-Christian development, shall be "diverse from all that were before it" (Daniel 7:7-19). So in Joel 2:2 is said here, "there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be anymore after it, even to the years of many generations." The symbolical locusts here described are probably the same which in Revelation (Revelation 9:11) are said to have as the "king over them the angel of the bottomless pit." The last scourge of the world, "the man of sin, the son of perdition" (2 Thessalonians 2:1-17), shall exceed all preceding scourges of the apostate Church in his 'satanic working' and "deceivableness of unrighteousness." As sin originally turned the "garden of Eden into a wilderness" (Joel 2:3), so shall the last great opponent of God and His people complete the moral desolation; while portents in the world of nature shall accompany the upheaval of states and the revolutions in ecclesiastical organizations (Joel 2:10). And all this shall be the introduction to "the great and very terrible day of the Lord" (Joel 2:11).
(3) Who, then, can abide it? (Joel 2:11) is the question which naturally suggests itself. We cannot avoid encountering, it: for "he is strong that executeth his word." But there is a way whereby we may encounter it without fear, nay, even with joy. This way the prophet proceeds to announce: "Therefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with all your heart" (Joel 2:12). Even now, though judgment is near, it is not too late. Long as sinners may have abused the forbearance of God, the door of repentance is not yet shut. The Lord Himself still appeals most lovingly to us, "Turn even to me." Any conversion that steps short of turning quite to God [which is the force of the Hebrew, 'aad] is short of saving conversion.
Moreover, he who truly turns to God, turns to Him "with all the heart." Let us search ourselves whether we have these marks of true conversion; whether we are satisfied with mere outward reformation, or have yielded up ourselves and all our affections wholly to Him.
(4) Outward indications of sorrow for sin usually accompany inward repentance. At the same time we should be (4) Outward indications of sorrow for sin usually accompany inward repentance. At the same time we should be more concerned about the inward reality than the outward show (Joel 2:13). To rend the garment as the badge of sorrow is easy, but to get the heart broken and contrite requires no less a power than that of the Almighty Spirit of God.
(5) The character of God in relation to His creatures, and especially in relation to those who are in even outward covenant with Him, affords the strongest inducements to turning to Him as OUR God. He is "gracious, merciful, slow to anger, abundant in goodness, and repenteth him of the evil." So far is God from taking pleasure in inflicting punishment, that He is most slow as to it, and most ready, if the sinner repents, to turn away from him the evil which his sins had deserved. If God were otherwise, despair would overwhelm us all; but the loving character of God holds out hope to the vilest, if they will but turn to Him. When men repent of their sin, God "repents" of the evil threatened against them (Joel 2:14).
(6) A solemn and general humiliation is prescribed as the means of averting judgments from the Church and state. Joel had before directed the "trumpet" to be "blown" (Joel 2:1), to sound the alarm of coming war. Now he directs, "Blow the trumpet in Zion," to "call a solemn assembly" (Joel 2:15), to avert that alarm of war. All classes from the highest to the lowest, priests and people, elders and children, even the Bridegroom and the bride, were to lift up their voice together as one man, deprecating the deserved judgments of God (Joel 2:16). So it shall be at last when God pours out the Spirit of supplications on His ancient people in their final coming tribulation. Their main plea shall then be an appeal to the honour of God as at stake in their deliverance: "Give not thine heritage to reproach, that the pagan should rule over them: wherefore should they say, Where is their God?" (Joel 2:17.) So we of the spiritual Israel may always plead the interest which God has in His Christian people's spiritual welfare, as the ground why He should avert from our Church and nation the judgments which our sins have merited.
(7) The prayer of true penitence and faith brings an immediate answer. "Then the Lord is jealous for his land" (Joel 2:18). As the husband whose heart yearns with affection over his erring but penitent wife is jealous with indignation against those who have maltreated her, so Yahweh, the husband of His people, will take away their past "reproach among the pagan" (Joel 2:19), and will "remove far off from" them their oppressor, because the latter has 'haughtily magnified himself in his doings' against the Lord and his people alike (Joel 2:20). Self-deifying pride and violence against the saints shall be the characteristics especially of the last Antichrist, as in some degree those features have characterized his Pagan and Popish forerunners. And these are the very things most provocative of God's indignation. As Antichrist "hath done great things" against the people of God, so Yahweh "will do great things" in their behalf (Joel 2:21). The great things which he did for them against Egypt, and then against Babylon (Psalms 126:2-3), are an earnest of the still greater things which He will yet do for them.
(8) In these great things the spiritual Israel also shall share. The earth (Joel 2:21), the lower animals (Joel 2:22) and above all, "the children of Zion," literal and spiritual, have good reason to "rejoice" in the prospects that are before them (Joel 2:23; Isaiah 61:10). The first advent of Christ as "the Lord our righteousness" was attended, as its consequence, with the outpouring of the Spirit "in due measure." But this "former rain" is not all; it is to be followed by "the latter rain" (Joel 2:23), or full outpouring of the Spirit upon Israel first, and then on the world "in the last days," (Joel 2:28; Isaiah 2:2, etc.) The gift shall then be universal, in a sense in which it has not yet been realized (Joel 2:29). It shall extend to all classes, even the most despised. The order of nature, which had been interrupted through, sin and apostasy, shall be restored (Joel 2:23-26). "Violence, wasting, and destruction" shall cease (Isaiah 60:18). Nations shall be spiritually born in a day, and Israel the foremost (Isaiah 66:8).
(9) But an ordeal of fearful trial, and portents in the skies and earth shall usher in "the great and the terrible day of the Lord" (Joel 2:30-31). Still the people of Yahweh shall be brought forth unhurt from that searching trial. God hath said, "My people shall never be ashamed" (Joel 2:26). Let us see that we belong to the people of God. All that is needed is that we "call on his name" as manifested in "the Lord" Jesus (Joel 2:32), and we shall be saved. The salvation which began to be proclaimed "in Jerusalem," has extended thence to "the remnant whom the Lord" is now "calling" out, in his sovereign grace, from among Jews and Gentiles. That remnant at His second coming shall reign with Him in glory. Truly, then we may "be glad and rejoice in the Lord our God" (Joel 2:23), and earnestly look for His coming again.