Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Joel 2:28
And it shall come to pass afterward, [that] I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
28. afterward ] After the bestowal of the material prosperity promised in Joe 2:23-26.
pour out ] i.e. send forth, not in scant measure, but abundantly: the measure of spiritual illumination, which was normally restricted to prophets or other favoured individuals, will be extended to all. The prophets regularly, in their visions of the future, look forward to an age when Israel will both enjoy the undisturbed possession of material benefits, and also be morally and spiritually regenerate: see e.g. Isa 29:18-24; Isa 30:23-25; Isa 32:1-8 (the change of character, which is to mark the ideal Israel of the future), Isa 32:15-18, Isa 33:5-6; Isa 33:24, Isa. 55:13, 14; Jer 31:12-14; Jer 31:33-34. For the gift of the spirit in particular, comp. Isa 32:15; Isa 44:3; Isa 59:21; Eze 36:27; Eze 39:29; Zec 12:10.
my spirit ] The ‘spirit’ in man is the principle of life, upon which consciousness and intelligence depend, and which imparts activity to the inert ‘flesh’ (see e.g. Gen 2:7; Isa 31:3; Isa 42:5; Eze 37:5; Eze 37:9-14; Psa 146:4): and the ‘spirit’ of God is analogously (in the O.T.) the conscious vital force peculiar to God, which, as proceeding from Him, is the power which creates and sustains the life of created beings (Gen 1:2; Job 33:4; Psa 104:30), and to the operation of which are attributed extraordinary faculties and activities of man, as well as supernatural spiritual gifts (see e.g. Gen 41:38; Exo 31:3; Num 11:17; Jdg 11:29 ; 1Sa 11:6; 1Sa 16:13; Mic 3:8; Isa 11:2; Isa 63:11; Psa 51:11; Hag 2:5; Neh 9:20; and compare the passages quoted at the end of the last note). The spirit of God is mentioned, as the source, in particular, of prophetic power (whether in its lower or higher forms) in Num 11:25-26; Num 11:29; 1Sa 10:6 ; 1Sa 10:10; 2Sa 23:2; Hos 9:7; Isa 42:1; Isa 59:21; Isa 61:1; Zec 7:12; Neh 9:30. Similarly here: Joel anticipates a time when the aspiration of Moses (Num 11:29) will be realized.
all flesh ] The expression is used ( a) sometimes in a wider sense to denote all living beings, including both mankind and animals, as Gen 6:17; Gen 6:19; ( b) sometimes in a narrower sense, of mankind alone, as Isa 40:5; Isa 49:26. Here it is used in the second sense: but the prophet, as the context shews, has in reality only Israel in his mind; other nations are pictured by him as destroyed (Joe 3:2; Joe 3:9 ff.). Comp. the surprise expressed in Act 10:45 at the Spirit being poured out upon the Gentiles.
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, &c.] Joel poetically specializes the operation of the spirit, in such a manner that it manifests itself differently in different classes of the people. The distinction is not to be understood with prosaic literalness any more than it is to be inferred from Isa 11:12 (see the Heb.) that Isaiah expected only the men of Israel, and the women of Judah, to return from exile.
prophesy ] i.e. will have insight into Divine truth, and will be moved to express it, in the manner which is at present confined to such as specially bear the name of prophets. The term is of course not to be misunderstood, as if it referred merely to predictions relating to the future: the reference is in general to inspired instruction in moral and religious truth. Two special modes of consciousness in which Divine truths frequently presented themselves to the prophet (Num 12:6) are then particularized, the dream and the vision: in illustration of the former, see Deu 13:2, Jer 23:25; Jer 23:32; Jer 27:9; Jer 29:8 (in these passages the dream is spoken of in terms of disparagement, on account of its liability to become a source of self-deception); for the latter, see on Amo 1:1; Amo 7:1.
young men ] how, it may be asked, do the “young men” differ from the “sons,” just before? Probably as older and more independent; it is the term often employed to denote the young, able-bodied warriors of Israel (2Ki 8:12; Jer 11:22; Jer 18:21).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And it shall come to pass afterward – After the punishment of the Jews through the Pagan, and their deliverance; after the Coming of the Teacher of righteousness, was to follow the outpouring of the Spirit of God.
I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh – o: This which He says, on all flesh, admits of no exception of nations or persons. For before Jesus was glorified, He had poured His Spirit only on the sons of Zion, and out of that nation only were there prophets and wise men. But after He was glorified by His Resurrection and Ascension, He made no difference of Jews and Gentiles, but willed that remission of sins should be preached to all alike.
All flesh – is the name of all mankind. So in the time of the flood, it is said all flesh had corrupted his way: the end of all flesh is come before Me. Moses asks, who of all flesh hath heard the voice of the Lord God, as we have, and lived? So in Job; in whose Hand is the breath of all flesh of man. If He set His heart upon man, if He gather to Himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together. And David; Thou that hearest prayer, to Thee shall all flesh come; let all flesh bless His Holy Name forever and ever Gen 6:12-13; Deu 5:26; Job 12:10; Job 34:14-15; Psa 65:2; Psa 145:21. In like way speak Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Zechariah Isa 40:5-6; Isa 49:26; Isa 66:16, Isa 66:23-24; Jer 25:31; Jer 32:27; Jer 45:5; Eze 20:48; Eze 21:4-5; Zec 2:13. The words all flesh are in the Pentateuch, and in one place in Daniel, used, in a yet wider sense, of everything which has life (Gen 6:17, Gen 6:19; Gen 7:15-16, Gen 7:21; Gen 8:17; Gen 9:11, Gen 9:15-17; Lev 17:14; Num 18:15; Dan 4:12; probably Psa 136:25); but, in no one case, in any narrower sense.
It does not include every individual in the race, but it includes the whole race, and individuals throughout it, in every nation, sex, condition, Jew or Gentile, Greek or Barbarian, i. e., educated or uneducated, rich or poor, bond or free, male or female. As all were to be one in Christ Jesus Gal 3:28, so on all was to be poured the Holy Spirit, the Bond who was to bind all in one. He names our nature from that which is the lowest in it, the flesh, with the same condescension with which it is said, The Word was made flesh , from where we speak of the Incarnation of our Blessed Lord, i. e., His taking on Him our Flesh. He humbled Himself to take our flesh; He came, as our Physician, to heal our flesh, the seat of our concupisceuce. So also God the Holy Spirit vouchsafes to dwell in our flesh, to sanctify it and to heal it. He, whom God saith He will pour out on all flesh, is the Spirit of God, and God. He does not say that He will pour out graces, or gifts, ordinary or extraordinary, influences, communications, or the like.
He says, I will pour out My Spirit; as Paul says, know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? 1Co 3:16. Ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His Rom 8:9-10. It is said indeed, on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit, but the gift of the Holy Spirit was the Holy Spirit Himself, as it had been just said, the Holy Spirit fell on all them that heard the word Act 10:44-45. It is said, the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, which is given us Rom 5:5; but the Holy Spirit is first given, and He poureth out into the soul the love of God. As God the Word, when He took human nature, came into it personally, so that the fullness of the Godhead dwelt bodily in it Col 2:9; so, really, although not personally, doth the Holy Spirit, and so the whole Trinity, enter into our mind by sanctification, and dwelleth in it as in His throne.
No created being, no Angel, nor Archangel could dwell in the soul. : God Alone can be poured out into the soul, so as to possess it, enlighten it, teach, kindle, bend, move it as He wills, sanctify, satiate, fill it. And as God is really present with the blessed, when He sheweth to them His Essence by the beatific vision and light of glory, and communicates it to them, to enjoy and possess; so He, the Same, is also in the holy soul, and thus diffuseth it in His grace, love, and other divine gifts. At the moment of justification, the Holy Spirit and so the whole Holy Trinity entereth the soul at His temple, sanctifying and as it were dedicating and consecrating it to Himself, and at the same moment of time, although in the order of nature subsequently, He communicates to it His love and grace. Such is the meaning of, We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him. This is the highest union of God with the holy soul; and greater than this can none be given to any creature, for by it we become partakers of the divine Nature, as Peter saith 2Pe 1:4. See here, O Christian, the dignity of the holiness whereunto thou art called and with all zeal follow after, preserve, enlarge it.
This His Spirit, God says, I will pour, i. e., give largely, as though He would empty out Him who is Infinite, so that there should be no measure of His giving, save our capacity of receiving. So He says of converted Israel, I have poured out My Spirit upon the house of Israel Eze 39:29, and, I will pour out upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication Zec 12:10.
And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy – This cannot limit what he has said, that God would pour out His Spirit upon all flesh. He gives instances of that out-pouring, in those miraculous gifts, which were at the first to be the tokens and evidence of His inward presence. These gifts were at the first bestowed on the Jews only. The highest were reserved altogether for them. Jews only were employed as Apostles and Evangelists; Jews only wrote, by inspiration of God, the oracles of God, as the source of the faith of the whole world. : The Apostles were sons of Israel; the Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the other women who abode at the same time and prayed with the Apostles, were daughters. Luke mentions, All these were persevering with one accord in prayer with the women and Mary the Mother of Jesus, and His brethren. These sons and daughters of the Sons of Zion, having received the Spirit, prophesied, i. e., in divers tongues they spoke of the heavenly mysteries.
In the narrower sense of foretelling the future, the Apostles, the Blessed Virgin Luk 1:48, Zacharias (Luk 1:67 ff), and Anna Luk 2:36, Luk 2:38, Elizabeth Luk 1:42-45, the virgin daughters of Philip Act 21:9, Agabus Act 11:28; Act 21:10-11, John in the Apocalypse, Simeon Luk 2:27-35, and Paul also oftentimes Act 20:29-30; 2Th 2:3-12; 2Ti 3:1, 2Ti 3:4; 1Ti 4:1 prophesied. At Antioch, there were certain prophets Act 13:1; and the Holy Spirit in every city witnessed, saying, that bonds and afflictions awaited him in Jerusalem Act 20:23. But it is superfluous, adds Theodoret after giving some instances, to set myself to prove the truth of the prophecy. For down to our times also hath this gift been preserved, and there are among the saints, people who have the eye of the mind clear, who foreknow and foretell many of the things which are about to be. So the death of Julian the Apostate, who fell, as it seemed, by a chance wound in war with the Persians was foreseen and foretold ; and Cyprian foretold the day of his own martyrdom and the close of Decian persecution, which ended through the death of the Emperor in a rash advance over a morass, when victory was gained . The stream of prophecy has been traced down through more than four centuries from the Birth of the Redeemer. One of the Bishops of the Council of Nice was gifted with a prophetic spirit .
Your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions – God often attempers Himself and His oracles to the condition of people, and appears to each, as suits his state Act 11:28; Act 21:10-11. It may then be, that to old men while sleeping by reason of age, He appeared most commonly in dreams; to young men, while watching, in visions. But it is so common in Hebrew, that each part of the verse should be filled up from the other, that perhaps the prophet only means, that their old and young should have dreams and see visions, and both from God. Nor are these the highest of Gods revelations; as He says, that to the prophet He would make Himself known in a vision and would speak in a dream, but to Moses mouth to mouth; even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold Num 12:6, Num 12:8.
The Apostles also saw waking visions, as Peter at Joppa (Act 10:10 ff; Act 11:5 ff); (and that so frequently, that when the Angel delivered him, he thought that it was one of his accustomed visions Act 12:9,) and Paul after his conversion, and calling him to Macedonia; and the Lord appeared unto him in vision at Corinth, revealing to him the conversions which should be worked there, and at Jerusalem foretelling to him the witness he should bear to Him at Rome. In the ship, the Angel of the Lord foretold to him his own safety, and that God had given him all who sailed with him Act 9:12; Act 16:6-7, Act 16:9; Act 18:9; Act 19:21; Act 23:11; Act 27:24. Ananias Act 9:10 and Cornelius Act 10:3 also received revelations through visions. But all these were only revelations of single truths or facts. Of a higher sort seems to be that revelation, whereby our Lord revealed to Paul Himself and His Gospel which Paul was to preach, and the wisdom of God, and the glories of the world to come, and the conversion of the Gentiles; and when he was caught up to the third heaven, and abundance of revelations were vouchsafed to him Gal 1:12, Gal 1:16; 1Co 2:7; Eph 3:3; 2Co 12:1-7.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Joe 2:28
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh.
The new Gospel era
The prophet had encouraged the nation to repentance by announcing the temporal blessings which would be consequent thereon. They would get the former rain, they would get the latter rain. The floors would be filled with wheat, and the fats would overflow with wine and oil. Desolation would vanish, plenty would return. This was the lower sphere of benediction consequent upon their repentance. Now the prophet mentions the higher blessing to follow,–the spiritual, of which the temporal was but a type.
I. That the new Gospel era would be characterised by a copious outpouring of the Holy Spirit (Joe 2:28).
1. The time. Afterward. In those days. To what time does this refer? To the days of the prophet? To the era of the law? Or, to the time when the promised Messiah should come? This outpouring of the Spirit seems to be connected by the prophet with the secular prosperity of which he had been speaking. He probably did not know the time to which his words had reference; but if it was in the future it was as real to his faith as the present to his sight. This promise no doubt had reference to the Messianic age, though Joel may not have been cognizant of the fact. It was not fulfilled at Bethlehem, nor in Gethsemane, nor at Calvary, nor at Olivet. It was still afterward. It was partially accomplished at Pentecost (Act 2:17), though there was concealed in it a deeper meaning than even Pentecost could impart, the entire significance of which we are as yet ignorant. We live in this afterward of time, and know its meaning, as did not the prophets of old; but the afterward of the kingdom of heaven has yet to evolve the universal reign of the Spirit of God.
2. The author. I will pour. This outpouring of the Holy Spirit was to be of Divine origin. It is the alone prerogative of the Eternal God to bestow the Spirit upon mankind. Joel did not connect the gift of the Spirit in any way with himself, or with any agency he could command. Nor did Peter on the day of Pentecost. Prophets and apostles, however distinguished they may have been, were not the authors but the channels of spiritual energy. Man cannot give the Holy Spirit to his fellow-man. Thoughtful books cannot bestow it; organisation cannot impart it. This is the testimony of Scripture; this is in conformity with human experience, and with the moral inability of man to originate good. Hence we must go to God for it. We must wait His time. We must comply with the moral conditions necessary to its reception. We must give Him the praise and glory of its advent in any measure. All true spiritual emotion is from above.
3. The extent. I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh The Divine Spirit was to be poured out without distinction of age, sex, country, or genius. It should be given to universal man. It would not be confined to the covenant nation. The poor, the slave, the unlearned–all should receive this gift. It would be poured out; not drop by drop, but as a mighty shower; even as copiously as the rain after the prayer of Elijah. The gift of the Spirit is not limited by any restraint upon the Divine ability to give. It is not limited by time. Sin cannot stay it, for grace abounds much more than sin. Then why is not spiritual influence more potently with us?
4. The effect. And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. This does not limit the universal application of the promise, but simply gives examples of those who shall realise it, and the effect it will have upon them. In the early ages of the church, the miraculous gifts of the spirit were imparted; but they have ceased, and, instead, we have illuminatio of soul, a beauteous insight into the truth of God, bright visions of destiny: for these are the things which now accompany and evince the presence of the Holy Ghost.
II. That the new Gospel era would be characterised by the most alarming temporal commotions. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke, etc. God gives successive revelations of Himself; revelations of the spirit of mercy, and also of the spirit of judgment. The phenomena here named are physical in their nature, but have a deep moral significance. The great events of Christianity have been signalised by phenomena in the material universe. The guiding of the star at the birth of Christ. The darkness of the sun at the Crucifixion. The wind and fire at Pentecost. Nature is in sympathy with the great plans of God. The progress of truth occasions many wondrous phenomena. It darkens many suns. It turns many moons into blood. It is in conflict with dark prejudice, with wilful error, with the carnal mind, with sinful passion, with old custom, with proud philosophy; hence the moral commotion intimated in the text, and illustrated by the history of Christ. But all these commotions will be penetrated and mitigated by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, will yield ultimate quietude when the voice of God shall be heard, and the peace of the Divine reign finally established.
III. That the new Gospel era would be characterised by a merciful arrangement for the salvation of all earnest suppliants. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered, etc.
1. Salvation in the time of peril. The Gospel era shall provide safety for human souls amidst the awful calamities which shall then befall the world.
2. Salvation in the time of despair.
3. Salvation on easy conditions. There might be mystery in the darkened sun, but not about the salvation to be had. It is to be had from God by prayer.
Lessons:–
1. That God is the author of all true reviving influence.
2. That the gift of the Holy Spirit is co-extensive with the range of universal life.
3. That in the Gospel era the Divine Spirit is richly manifest.
4. That while we must anticipate times of moral commotion, we must also expect times when the redemptive purpose shall be more fully manifest. (J. S. Exell, M. A.)
The nature of the great spiritual change which we anticipate
This prophecy was not finally fulfilled upon the day of Pentecost. The effusion of the Spirit on that day must be regarded as typical of the final outpouring of the Spirit in the last ages of the world.
1. The necessity of an effusion of the Divine Spirit in order to accomplish the change that is needed. There never can be such a transformation, as the principles of Christianity show to be required by the condition of the world, except by a mighty and resistless agency on the hearts of men by the Holy Spirit of God.
The necessity of this effusion will appear if you consider–
1. The absolute and perfect failure of all agency apart from Him, which hitherto has been employed by man.
2. The precise and essential nature of the change which is anticipated and desired. It is not a change in the external aspect of things, it is a change of principle; it is a change of motives; it is the transformation of all opposition on the part of man towards the government of God, and interests of eternity.
3. The appropriation to the Divine Spirit of the various offices which are assigned to Him in the economy of redemption. It is the Spirit who quickens, who converts the soul, who urges to faith, who instructs, guides, consoles, seals, etc.
4. The ascription to the Spirit of the great change in the latter day which we are led to anticipate throughout the whole structure of the prophetic writings. Whoever looks for the renovation of future times, and the amelioration of the state of man, to any agent short of the one to which we now ascribe it, is most grievously mistaken, and does most impiously blaspheme.
II. The mode in which the effusion of the Divine spirit will be conducted.
1. The effusion of the Divine Spirit will he preceded by remark able and extensive providential changes in human society. With regard to the precise instrumentality employed, few would venture on distinct assertion. Possibly much public agitation and national convulsion may he necessary.
2. It will be immediately associated with the propagation of the Word of God, and the use of importunate prayer.
3. The effusion of the Divine Spirit will be imparted with great and extraordinary rapidity. Hitherto there has been but a slow impartation of spiritual influence. Two topics need consideration.
(1) Whether the era of the final effusion of the Spirit will be introduced by miraculous agency.
(2) At what time may the effusion be expected.
III. The effects which the effusion of the spirit will produce. On the Church–removing its ignorance, and healing its divisions: sanctifying its members. On the world–it shall then be given to God. (James Parsons.)
Prosperity and the Spirit
Upon the promises of physical blessing there follows another of the outpouring of the Spirit: the prophecy by which Joel became the prophet of Pentecost, and through which his book is best known among Christians. The order of events makes us pause to question: does Joel mean to imply that physical prosperity must precede spiritual fulness? It would be unfair to assert that he does, without remembering what he understands by the physical blessings. To Joel these are the token that God has returned to His people. The drought and the famine produced by the locusts were signs of His anger and of His divorce of the land. The proofs that He has relented and taken Israel back into a spiritual relation to Himself, can, therefore, from Joels point of view, only be given by the healing of the peoples wounds. In plenteous rains and full harvests Goal sets His seal to mans penitence. Rain and harvest are not merely physical benefits, but religious sacraments: signs that God has returned to His people, and that His zeal is again stirred on their behalf (Joe 1:18). This haste be made clear before there can be talk of any higher blessing. God has to return to His people and to show His love for them before He pours forth His Spirit upon them.. . . From Joels standpoint physical blessings may have been as religious as spiritual, but we must go further, and assert that for Joels anticipation of the baptism of the Spirit by a return of prosperity, there is an ethical reason, and one which is permanently valid in history. A certain degree of prosperity, and even of comfort, is an indispensable condition of that universal and lavish exercise of the religious faculties, which Joel pictures under the pouring forth of Gods Spirit. The history of prophecy itself furnishes us with proofs of this. And has it been otherwise in the history of Christianity? An acute historian observes that every religious revival in England has happened upon a basis of comparative prosperity. (G. Adam Smith, D. D.)
The manifestation of the Holy Ghost
Joel appears to move in the circle of moral convictions, and of eschatelogical hopes. He has been called the prophet of the manifestation of the Holy Ghost.
I. A prediction of the coming of the Holy Ghost.
1. I will pour out. These words suggest the abundance of the gift.
2. The effusion was to be Of My Spirit, that is, the Holy Ghost.
II. The extent of that manifestation.
1. Upon all flesh. This means upon all mankind. Giving the idea of an universal religion.
2. The gift is said to descend upon all flesh, naming that which is lowest in our nature.
3. The outpouring only began on the day of Pentecost.
4. This outpouring will continue to flow on as long as the world lasts. See three effects of the Spirits presence and operation in the souls of men, which are of the
Greatest practical moment–
1. His presence has given a greater malignity to sin, m that, through His indwelling, sin is now brought so near to the Holy God; because the light which the Spirit imparts robs sin of the excuse of ignorance. And because sin is now committed, in spite of that new power to resist it which is bestowed by the presence of the Holy Ghost.
2. The presence of the Spirit, with His fruits and gifts, carries with it a higher standard and ideal than that of the old covenant.
3. The presence of the Spirit should impart fervour to all devotional exercises. (Sunday in Church.)
The promise of the Spirit
We, as well as the people of nineteen centuries ago, have an interest in the prophecy of Joel. Whithersoever the quickening influences of the Spirit of God shall come, there shall be spiritual life. And is not this the real want of the age? The term revival is frequently mentioned in these days.
I. What is a revival? It is the renewal in effect and continuation of what took place under the preaching of the Word at Pentecost, when thousands of spiritually ignorant and perishing men were first quickened. Religion is a life, even the life of God in the soul. Without spiritual vitality there can be no real personal religion. Spiritual life is kindled in the soul by the Spirit of God. The first indications of this life are generally, not invariably, alarm. Its first act is faith. This life requires nourishment, and that is supplied chiefly by the Word of God and prayer. It has its inward growth and its outward manifestations. The spiritual life may be likened to an exotic. Revivals, or what is equivalent to them, are in separate departments of life found to be universally and indispensably needed. The Reformation in Germany was a gigantic revival. About 1743, within two or three years, thirty or forty thousand souls were born into the family of heaven. Numbers object, to extended religious manifestations, because of the excitement which sometimes attends them. Some measure of excitement is, however, in the nature of things, inseparable from a time of awakening, either of one or of many. Many object to seasons of revival, because of the suddenness with which some conversions are effected: but there are various operations of the Spirit. A revival is just the gracious sovereign putting forth of Divine power on a great scale, to effect largely what in ordinary times takes place in one here and there through a community.
II. What are the signs that a revival is needed by us? Weakness and fainting in some, and death in others. What is Christian life in its essence? It is the implanted, earnest, ever-expanding taste for and aspiration after the living God, reconciled in Christ, as ones all in all. It is that this state may become the state of every one of us, we need a revival.
III. What are the hindrances to a revival among us? Their name is legion.
1. Hindrances in the Church. Unbelief is the sin which most easily besets us. It is the common crying sin of the Church. We are straitened in our own faith and hope. Dis union. Conformity to the world.
2. Hindrances in the world. Ignorance, indifference, infidelity, intemperance.
IV. What are the means by which we and others might receive a revival? Earnest, scriptural, impressive preaching. Earnest, instant, individual, and social prayer. Domestic discipline, instruction, and family worship. If we are to be Christians at all, we must be growing Christians. There is no such thing as standing still in the Divine life. Life is a battlefield on which the Christian soldier is either gaining ground or losing it. (James Stirling Muir.)
The outpouring of the Holy Spirit essential to a revival of religion
I. The animating prediction. Note the object promised, it was the Spirit. The term Spirit is used to denote His miraculous and gracious influences. The Spirit is a person. The influences of the Spirit may be considered as miraculous and as common. The former were peculiar to the apostolic age, the latter must be regarded as the privilege of believers in every period of time. Observe the persons who shall receive the Spirit. It will be poured out upon all flesh. This embraces the whole human race. Observe the season when this prediction will be verified. The last days, i.e., this entire present dispensation, the final economy of mercy to the world.
II. The glorious effects connected with the dispensation of the spirit. Notice the blessings of the Spirit, as seen in the apostles–they were qualified by it for their work. And as it respects the revival of religion, the Gospel is attended with extraordinary success.
III. The means by which this Divine influence may be more eminently enjoyed by us in the present day.
1. By a more decided and elevated tone of piety in the members of our churches.
2. By consecrating much time to devotion.
3. By a distinguished zeal in the promotion of those institutions which advance Immanuels cause.
4. By increasing harmony and affection among the disciples of Christ. Love to the brethren is the peculiar excellence of Christianity, the badge of discipleship, and the glory of religion. (W. Yates.)
The promise of the Spirit
This is the great Old Testament promise of the gift of the Holy Spirit; the first in order of time, the first in degree of importance. In the earlier Scriptures we find occasional allusions to the work of the Spirit. The prophecy of Joel contains the first utterance upon this great subject. Joel is thought by some to be the oldest of the Hebrew prophets who wrote. The structure of this prophecy is very simple. In the first we find Gods judgments upon His people. Their obtaining mercy. The punishment of their enemies. In the remainder of the book we have–
1. The call to repentance.
2. The promise of blessing.
3. The judgment of the ungodly.
Of the promise of the Spirit, which is the culminating point in the announcement of blessing, we have the warrant of St. Peter for saying that it received a fulfilment on the day of Pentecost. The expression pour out cannot be applied literally to a Divine person. It is symbolical, and adopted from the promise of rain in verse 23. The Lord Jesus, during His ministry, took up the promise, and both expanded and renewed it. There was, however, a condition upon the fulfilment of which the gift of the Spirit was contingent. The glorification of Jesus was to precede the outpouring of the Holy Ghost. It was to be the peculiar office of the Spirit to testify of, and glorify Christ, by taking of the things of Christ, and showing them to His people. But while we see in Pentecost a fulfilment of the prophecy, we may ask whether the Old Testament promise was exhausted upon the day of Pentecost. Certainly it was not. The prophecy is asserted by St. Peter to be co-extensive with the Divine calling, to run side by side with that calling so long as it shall continue, to belong therefore to the whole Christian dispensation. The last days is the New Testament term descriptive of the entire interval between the first and second advents. There are certain special and peculiar manifestations of the Spirit. God at times vouchsafes a gracious outpouring both upon the Church and the world. Have we any ground for expecting any such remarkable visitation in the present day? In examining the structure of the prophecy of Joel, we note the following sequences:
(1) The call to repentance, addressed to the professing people of God,
(2) The promise of blessing, culminating in the promise of the Spirit.
(3) The announcements of judgments to be inflicted upon the enemies of God and His Church. This sequence of events took place in connection with Pentecost.
There was then–
(1) The universal preaching of repentance to the Jewish nation.
(2) The outpouring of the Spirit.
(3) The infliction of signal vengeance upon those who proved themselves to be the deadly enemies of the true Church of God.
Are there any events of a similar kind taking place at the present time? It has been too much the habit with Christians to rest satisfied with a very partial and moderate fulfilment of the promise of the Spirit. It is scriptural to indulge the expectation of such a holy revival. It is desirable that such fulfilment should take place. It is possible, may I not say probable, that such blessed results may be accomplished. But in what way are we to act, so that we may reasonably expect the blessing?
1. Remove the hindrances which stand in the way of such outpouring of the Spirit. The unholiness which exists in the Church of God. Ignorance and misapprehension regarding the work of the Spirit, and the nature of religious revival. The personal responsibility of all Christians in relation to the extension of the Redeemers kingdom is not felt as it should be.
2. Adopt the means by which a religious revival may be promoted. The faithful preaching of the Divine Word. Real, hearty, believing, united, and persevering prayer. (Emilius Bayley.)
The Holy Spirit promised
The development of the redemptive scheme is by a succession of stages. Each stage is an advance upon the preceding. The finger of prophecy as well as of providence points forward. The eyes of the heathen were turned lack ward. Their golden age was past. Not so the Jews. So Christianity is a religion of expectancy. Though in the final stage of the worlds development, we are far from the end of that stage. The remedial agencies are working, but the remedy is not yet wrought. We have a sufficient revelation, but we have not yet fathomed it. We have a fixed though not a finished faith. Christianity is aspiring, hopeful, confident. The Holy Spirit made known, through Joel, that in the ages to come there would be established, through His own abundant and universal effusion, a new order of things unspeakably more glorious and happy than anything hitherto known.
I. The extent of the blessing. Extent both in the sense of amplitude and degree. The promise is to all, without distinction of age, sex, nationality, or degree. The Spirit of God had been in the world before the last days began, but, in no such plenitude and power as after His effusion. The words pour out imply abundance and richness. The three usual forms of special Divine revelation known to the Hebrews,–prophecy, visions, dreams,–indicate the fulness of the blessing; and the inclusion of all classes, down to slaves, shows the extent of the blessing. Nor is the prophecy confined to the Hebrew nation. On the Gentiles as well as the Jews was the Spirit poured out. The true doctrine as to the extent of the Holy Spirits operation may be thus summarised.
1. The expression all flesh is to be taken literally, including not only all the nations of the earth, but every individual of every nation. Not that the Holy Spirit has the same direct influence upon all. That is not possible, since the means and instruments through which He works are not at hand to the same degree in all. Much of his work in the more favoured nations is in behalf of the less favoured. This is true of individuals also. Man is part spirit, and is capable of receiving and recognising the monitions of the Father Spirit. No soul of man, not even the darkest and most degraded, is neglected by the Holy Spirit. However dull it may be, still there is a con science, a Divine spark, and that is responsive to the breath of the Divine Spirit. In numberless ways does the Spirit make Himself felt all the way from childhood to age. And at times the Spirit makes special appeals.
2. To what extent, in the sense of degree, is the Spirit given? Thus far no response on the part of man has been supposed. The Spirit comes to him self-moved, not because man wants Him, but because He wants man. It is His aim to persuade man to open his heart to receive Him. But man is free, and can open it or bar it closer. With what measure of fulness and blessing does the Spirit come? The language of prophecy leads us to expect great things. The fountain is inexhaustible and the supply abundant. Fulness of possession is the only natural limit of the promises blessing. As a matter of fact the Spirit does fill every soul just so fast and far as He is permitted. It does not follow that, if all were to receive Him to the fullest extent possible, they would have Him in the same measure, or possess the same spiritual power. That depends upon their capacity and ability. Nor does fulness of the Spirit necessarily imply the possession of miraculous power. That power may depend on the possession of peculiar natural gifts.
II. The nature of the blessing.
1. The gift of the Spirit is a gift of enlightenment. The natural man, however highly endowed, fails to under stand the things of the Spirit. To them his mind is dark; but when the Spirit comes into a soul, light comes with Him.
2. It is a gift of purification. The Scripture emblems of the purifying power of the Holy Ghost are water and fire. One cleanses by washing away, the other by burning up impurities. Light let into a dungeon does not remove its foulness; no more does illumination purify the heart; the Holy Ghost not only enlightens but cleanses. He is water to wash away the impurities of sin, fire to burn up the dross of nature.
3. It is a gift of power. At Jerusalem the disciples were endued with power from on high. The Holy Spirit in a man makes him an engine of power. He is strong to endure, for God is with him. He is bold in speech, efficient in action, prevalent in prayer. Illustrate by St. Paul, Luther, Nettleton, Finney, Moody, etc.
4. It is a gift of joy. Illustrated in the ecstasies of the early disciples. There is a joy in the Holy Ghost. (Sermons by Monday Club.)
The outpouring of the Spirit the property and security of the Church of God
I. The subjects of this especial mercy. It is a word from the God of all grace to that people, and touching their increase, who profess to be the Church of God, which He hath purchased with His own blood. Their increase are designated as all flesh, your sons and your daughters, your old men, your young men, the servants, the handmaids. All that are afar off. With this limitation, As many as the Lord our God shaft call.
II. The mercy itself which is promised. The Spirit is the Holy Ghost, the third person in the ever-blessed and glorious Trinity. The effusion, or pouring out, which is here promised, is the communication of His precious influences, for spiritual life, health, comfort, strength, love, wisdom unto salvation. The similitude is taken from abundant and fertilising showers.
III. The primary displays of its reception are to be noticed. Sons and daughters prophesy, etc. See Act 13:12. Admonitions against the abuse of these special gifts is found in 1Co 12:7; 1Co 14:22.
IV. The permanent power and presence involved in this promise. The power of the infinite Jehovah is involved in His perpetual presence with His people. The accomplishment of this promise constitutes the character, and demonstrates the existence, of the true Church of the living God, wheresoever it is to be found upon earth: and the permanent power and presence therein involved ensures the existence and increase of that Church. (William Borrows, M. A.)
Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions.
Dreaming dreams and seeing visions
The age is against us. The youth of the world with its buoyancy has given place to the fin de siecle, the old age of the weary Titan, with its spiritual fatigue. You feel this everywhere. It is not only in our hard, analytic views of nature that we feel this death of dreams; all life is alike. The young man to-day will find the world no way congenial to the dreamer; it will only be through a thick fog that he will see his visions. Take city life. How visionless all life seems to you, covered inch deep with dust, and that not of the cleanest. There is not much space for poetry in the model lodging-house, or furnished apartments. A hive of industry the city may be, but dreams and visions are no part of its output. Turn to the factory. In old times mans work was itself a dream. The factory system has killed all that. To-day in every sphere of life the young man will find a subtle penetrating realism banishing all visions, a fog that can be felt chilling down every enthusiasm. Nevertheless, the prophet Joel was right: dreams and visions are the very salt for all life, its one reality. All life will ultimately be weighed by this one thing,–the ideals to which men stood true in spite of every difficulty. Take the life of a nation. The study of that life is history. Look then at Greece, Rome, Israel, or any other nation, and you will find that its dreams and visions are the all in a nations history which does not die. History is, in fact, but the science of regulated enthusiasms and their results. Hope makes history a progress instead of a cycle. The deathless element in English life and history does not find its way into our text books. Its real gold is those priceless ideas of liberty, law, and true individuality, which have been the lode-star of her destinies. The most certain verdict of history is this: when a nation once loses its dreams and visions, its end has come. That which is true of the nation is no less true of the individual. The value of every man must ultimately be reckoned by the only changeless standard of value–the dreams and visions that were his. We must be careful not to narrow down the currency of heaven to realisations only. The history of religion, in fact, is but the record of how the enthusiasms of some enthusiast have permeated and changed the lives of men. Buddhism, Mohammedanism, Jesuitism, are all the slowly stiffening result of mighty dreams. Urge every young man to be an idealist. Do not be ashamed to have your enthusiasms. The true idealist never lives in cloudland; he ever seeks to have his home amid the stern realities of life. He seeks to lift the real up to the ideal. Take the roughest blocks, and be a seer, like Michael Angelo; see in them what God sees, the possibilities of higher things. It is the idealism of Jesus that is the salvation of the world. You can be an idealist even in business. Take your dreams and visions into life as a citizen; into your politics; into your home; into the Church. (Herbert B. Workman.)
A quickened imagination
Joel dips into the far future and sees the downcoming of the Holy Ghost. So clear is his vision that he minutely notes the effects of this marvellous effusion. But the signs we expect him to enumerate he misses. Not a word about a whiter heart and a nobler life, about miraculous power, or irresistible speech. All these he ignores; it is the unexpected and apparently the secondary and unimportant effects that fasten his attention. To him the outstanding feature of the days of the Holy Ghost is a quickened imagination–a power to dream dreams and see visions. If man be compared to a house, there is the cellar which is dark and self-contained, representing the appetites and impulses, there is the ground floor with the windows of taste and smell looking out upon the immediate neighbourhood, there is the upper storey whose windows of seeing and hearing command a wider prospect, and there is the highest storey with the window of the imagination opening out into the vast unseen. When this house becomes the temple of the Holy Ghost all the rooms are beautified and all the windows cleansed; but to the prophet the window that gleams the brightest is the roof window, the faculty that is stirred the deepest is the imagination. The old men had been dwelling in the lower rooms all the days of their lives, and during all the long years the upper stories had been all but forgotten. The windows of the imagination are darkened by dust and curtained by cobwebs. When the Spirit comes there is cleansing enough, but on account of the long neglect the window will never become translucent again. The objects seen through will be vague and shadowy. The old men only dream dreams. The dreaminess comes from the neglect. But the young men led by curiosity and romance have explored all the rooms from the roof to the basement. All the windows have been put to use, even if the use has not always been the noblest; and under the influence of the Spirit they become clear as crystal, through which are seen definite and luminous the realities of the unseen. The young men see visions. Their imagination is unspoiled by worldliness and neglect. But in old and young the action of the Spirit is the same, only in the one it revives the embers, and in the other it fans the flame. It is strange that the prophet should have singled out the imagination, for the coming of the Spirit is as the coming of the spring. Everything in its track is born again. The spring causes a tide of life to rush through all creation, and all but burst everything. The buds burst into blossom, the hard crust of the earth bursts into green, and the birds burst forth into song. All nature is roused into an extraordinary activity. When God comes into a mans soul it is the same; every faculty is stirred, every power is quickened, the heart is tenderer, the mind is clearer, the senses are keener, the body is healthier; a wondrous tide of life rushes through the whole man. The Spirit comes as a mighty wind, and as all the multitudinous leaves of a tree are swayed by the wind, so are all the faculties of a man swayed by the Spirit. But stirred as are all the souls activities it is the extraordinary activity of the imagination that catches the eye of the prophet. But why this strange selection? The choice is strange because it is right, and daring because it is according to the mind of God. He singles out the imagination because when Gods Spirit descends on men His principal work is to make them realise the spiritual world; and the realisation of the spiritual world is the task of the imagination. All around us there is a world of matter and motion, with its hills and plains, minerals and forests, towns and streets and factories. We see it with our eyes, and are familiar with its features and movements. But vast as this world is, it pales into insignificance beside the great unseen world that is above and around and within us, a world that outleaps all measurement and outruns all duration, more real than the solid earth, more permanent than the everlasting hills; the home of God and Jesus, of angels innumerable and the spirits of just men made perfect, to be seen by no eyes of flesh, seen alone by the eye of the soul–the imagination. (Thos. Phillips.)
Seeing God in dreams
You may say of a dream that it is nocturnal fantasia, or that it is the absurd combination of waking thoughts; but God has honoured the dream by making it the avenue through which He has marched upon the human soul, decided the fate of nations, and changed the course of the worlds history. Does God appear in our day, and reveal Himself through dreams?
1. The Scriptures are so full of revelation from God that if we get no communication from Him in dreams, we ought, nevertheless, to be satisfied.
2. All dreams have an important meaning. They prove that the soul is comparatively independent of the body.
3. The vast majority of dreams are merely the result of disturbed physical conditions, and are not a supernatural message. A great many dreams are merely narcotic disturbance. Do not mistake narcotic disturbance for Divine revelation.
4. Our dreams are apt to be merely the echo of our daytime thoughts. The scholars dream is a philosophic echo. The poets dream is a rhythmic echo. It is, however, capable of proof that God does sometimes in our day appear to people in dreams. All dreams that make you better are from God. It is possible to prove that God does appear in dreams to warn, to convert, to save men. Illustrate: John Newtons dreams. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)
The properties of the Gospel dispensation
This prophecy was fulfilled to the letter, as described in Act 2:1-47., nine centuries afterwards. By the Gospel dispensation we mean the Church. The Christian dispensation was to be a spiritual dispensation. The older was a religion of form. It represented truth. It was a school of object-lessons, a kind of kindergarten. It was a system of forms so perfect as to command the admiration of all ages to the present time. The kingdom the prophet foresaw would be set up would not be dependent on these earthly forces–authority, wealth, intelligence–but upon something far beyond and above. The Spirit of God was to be its energy, its potent force. This spiritual outpouring had its power in these facts–
1. It communicated God to us.
2. It associates God with us.
3. It develops God in us.
Observe the development of power when there is this pouring out of the Spirit. A prophesying power; and a witnessing power. We have also brought out in this prophecy the fact of freedom following the outpouring of the Spirit. Freedom from the guilt of sin. Freedom from the bondage of sin. Freedom from all fear because of sin. And we are told that this outpouring of the Spirit would be accompanied with great convulsions, mighty signs. So it proved. In view of our privileges as partakers of the Spirit, what is our duty? We should seek more and more of this outpouring, and we should seek to bear witness everywhere to the truths it reveals to us. (C. H. Tiffany, D. D.)
The Gospel dispensation
This passage exhibits the leading features of Christianity.
I. The gospel dispensation was to be characterised by spirituality. I will pour out My Spirit.
1. Formerly the Spirit dwelt with man.
2. Whereas formerly the Spirit dwelt with men, now He dwells in them, There is a sense in which the Spirit was not given to men before the day of Pentecost. This sense is explained in Joh 14:15-17. Jesus was the first human being in whom the Spirit abode
II. The Gospel dispensation was to be characterised by liberty. In Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance.
1. The Gospel finds us in chains.
(1) In bondage under the tyranny of sin.
(2) He also trembles under the tyranny of death.
(3) The terrors of hell are upon him.
2. But the Gospel bursts our bonds in sunder. The believer is justified by the merits of Christ.
III. The Gospel dispensation was to be characterised by power. I will show wonders, etc.
1. Here are marvellous spiritual signs. Prophecy, as prediction and as preaching. Visions. At the inauguration of Christianity there were apparitions. Throughout the dispensation there have been spiritual revelations. Dreams.
2. Here also are stupendous physical wonders. Some of these were associated with the great transactions on Calvary. Some were associated with the complementary transactions upon Zion. These wonders show that Omnipotence is behind the truth.
IV. The Gospel dispensation was to be characterised by expansiveness.
1. Its salvation is universally free.
2. The conditions of this salvation are level to all capacities.
3. The expansiveness of the Gospel triumphs over conventionalities. Both the social and the national. (J. Alexander Macdonald.)
The coming conflict
No gift of God is intended to remain a gift only. Gifts are means to serve other ends. The rain is a gift, but it is a means toward the harvest. The gift of the Spirit suggests a harvest for which that precious rain of God descended. The gifts are bestowed in anticipation of the hour when they will be needed. The responsibility is not the responsibility of possession merely, but the responsibility of anticipation. The hour comes when the tests of God will be applied. How very real the vision of the great conflict is in the prophets eyes. It is as real and as vivid in its reality as the plague of locusts, He has no doubt that it will take place. He has no doubt about its issue. The power which makes certain the issue, and gives security to the combatants has been vouchsafed. The gift of the Spirit is the gift of safety. The principle of spiritual life is independent of time. There are things which we can prepare for better when we know the hour; but in the things of the Spirit it is better to prepare not knowing the day nor the hour; for the readiness is the readiness of a spiritual quality which cannot be attained in a moment, nor yet by a fixed hour. The spiritual principle in the words of the prophet is, that every gift of the Spirit must be followed by some decisive conflict–in which all the forces which are allied with the Spirit are thrown into antagonism with all that are hostile to the Spirit. Was it not so after the day of Pentecost? The gift of the Spirit was the revelation of the kingdom of the Spirit. But what war followed! It is thus that the order of God succeeds itself. His first gift is love. His second is illumination. His last is conflict. In the Gospels, the gift of earths bounties comes first. Christ feeds the multitude. The gift of vision in the darkness follows. He reveals himself in the darkness on the sea. The third stage is achievement, or readiness to face the conflict. To the disciple ready to venture the raging waves He says, Come. God never calls men to trial but He first prepares them by a gift of power and illumination. In other words, the fresh baptism of the Spirit is to prepare for the baptism of fire. Fire purges in the truest sense; water cleanses. Fire penetrates to the very heart of things; water may leave much that is corrupt to decay and to destroy. I am no friend of working through mere terrors, but we may remind ourselves that the questions which are stirring around us are just those which are calculated to test in the most complete and thorough way the foundations and structure of society as we now know it. Take the condition of Theology, the tenets of Socialism, the reconstructions demanded by evolutionary theories. But we know enough in current literature and current thought to satisfy ourselves that we need not be shaken in mind or troubled should some fiery trial try us. May we not say that the trial begins in the mind of every man who tries to apply the teaching of Christ his Lord in all loyal simplicity to the facts of life and duty? Who may abide? Who can come forth bright and purged from this flaming baptism that is in store for the men and women of this generation? Would not the answer be, he alone can sustain that ordeal who has been prepared in the fire for the fire; he alone can stand in the day when all things are shaken whose character and spirit are built up of those very things which cannot be shaken? Better fall into His consuming fire that in that flame all evil, self–all folly and weakness may be burned up, than wait unpurged for the day which shall burn like an oven. When He baptized us with the Holy Ghost and with fire, did He not baptize us to sacrifice, even the sacrifice of our bodies and souls, a living sacrifice to Him? He who, led by the Spirit, makes his life a sacrifice, and passes through the fire feeling it for very loves sake to be no fire–need not fear the day of the Lord, for on such the fire of the fierce trial of the world has no power. (Bishop Boyd Carpenter.)
The seer
The preacher need not fear the taunt that he is an other-worldly man, a dreamer, a visionary. He may accept it with satisfaction, for it is true. His main concern lies in the realm of the unseen. He does business in deep waters. He stands face to face with the eternal. The Japanese cherish a tradition concerning Sho-Kaku. They say that, even when a lad, he loved to wander among the beech-trees, and up the green slopes of the mountain, where his solitary musings brought him such gentleness that he never hurt any living thing, and such purity that the tropical rains could not wet the web of wistaria fibres which clothed him! Such virtue and merit became his that at length the material world became quite subject to him. He could walk upon the water, fly through the air, see into the future, and heal the diseases of his friends. Then he was commanded to undertake a more difficult achievement, and, as a means towards success in it, to ascend the summit of Mount Omine in Yamato. He neither doubted nor delayed, but hewed for himself a path to the far-away mountain top; and when at last he reached it, standing on the bare space of jasper, no larger than a threshing-floor, polished smooth with many storms, he beheld a weird sight. There stood a huge white skeleton, grasping in its bony hand a great untarnished sword. An inward voice bade him, if he would triumph in the mighty enterprises marked out for him, to secure that glittering weapon. Yet it was no easy task. He grasped the sword, but the dead hand clung to it; he tried to wrench away the whitened bones, but they were as riveted iron, until he bethought himself of the spells of the spirit, and as he uttered them the skeleton limbs relaxed slowly, and the sword dropped, so that he could seize and brandish it triumphantly in the light of the setting sun. The eastern legend enshrines a truth of universal application. The men who have been most despised as visionaries, as dreamers of dreams, as other-worldly men, have done more to shape this world than have their more practical critics.
I. The preacher must have a vision of Deity. A man who has had no personal experience of the presence and power of God cannot possibly impress others with the august and intense reality of things eternal. In the journal of an old Puritan Divine were found these words: Resolved that, when I address a large meeting, I shall remember that God is there, and that will make it small. Resolved that, when I address a small meeting, I shall remember that God is there, and that will make it great. It is said that, when Chrysostom was composing his sermons he was wont to fancy that the communion rails around the pulpit were crowded with listening angels. It was a splendid inspiration. But the truth is grander still. Dr. Gordon dreamed that, when he preached, the Christ sat in the pew. It is verily so. The preacher needs such a vision of Deity as will fill his whole horizon with the grandeur of the Divine, and assure him, in the hours of loneliness and listlessness, of the stupendous fact that God is his Witness and Co-worker.
II. The preacher must have a vision of humanity.
1. He needs a vision of the sinfulness of men.
2. He must have a vision of the inner life of men. He must know that the most careless of his hearers is not really so callous as he seems. Every man, in his secret and silent moments, has thoughts of God, and sin, and eternity, that will not be silenced. And no man who has had a true vision of humanity will take it for granted that any man is absolutely without some prickings of conscience with regard to personal sin. He will carry Christ to every soul that is aching and longing after Him.
3. He needs a vision of the possibilities of men. The preacher is like Little Nell in The Old Curiosity Shop. You remember how she discovered the sin in which the old man had become absorbed in the dreadful city. So she took him by the hand and led him away from it all, out into the green fields, and away to a happier, purer life. It is the privilege of the man of God to take men by the hand, and lead them out of the murky atmosphere of their sins into the purity and sublimity of the Divine salvation, Christ saves from the nethermost depth to the uttermost height.
III. The preacher must have a vision of eternity. This will add solemnity to all his work. He cannot afford to trifle. The biographer of Archbishop Leighton tells us that, in the days when it was the custom of the presbytery to inquire if all the preachers bad preached to the times, Leighton acknowledged on one occasion that he had not. He was asked why. Surely, he replied, if all these brethren have preached to the times, one poor brother may be allowed to preach for eternity! Napoleon, we are told, found an artist engrossed in his painting. What are you doing that for? the Emperor asked. For immortality! the artist proudly replied. How long will your canvas last? inquired Napoleon. It will last for at least a thousand years, sire! answered the man. Aha! responded the Emperor, we have now an artists conception of immortality! We have a loftier ideal than that. The preacher deals face to face with the intensities of eternity. He has a vision of the glories of heaven, and he toils that he may allure to brighter worlds, and lead the way. He has a vision of bell, and he is prepared to labour day and night that he may save his fellow-men from such a fearful doom. Harrison Ainsworth has drawn, in Solomon Eagle, a picture of the passionate earnestness that becomes an enthusiast who believes his fellows to be doomed, and would warn them of their peril. Lord Lytton has drawn a similar character in Olinthus, who, on the night on which Pompeii was destroyed, hurried from place to place entreating men to repent. Are we as anxious about men, asked Dr. Dale, as our fathers were? On any theory of eschatology there is a dark and menacing future for those who have been brought face to face with Christ in this life, and have refused to receive His salvation, and to submit to His authority. I do not ask whether the element of fear has a great place in our preaching, but whether it has a great place in our hearts, whether we ourselves are afraid of what will come to men who do not believe in Christ, whether we, whether our people, are filled with an agonising earnestness for their salvation. (F. W. Boreham.)
The dreams of youth
The thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts. Pity the one who has no dreams, for it means he has no ideals, and if youth has no ideals manhood will be very commonplace. We have no patience with those who cynically sneer at the visions of youth and dash cold water upon all early hope and ardour, prophesying with a cynical assumption of wisdom an inevitable disappointment, a bitter disillusioning
I. Dreams of prosperity. This may seem to be the basest of all the dreams that youth can cherish, and if it simply means a dream of gain to follow gain till the dreamer can take his place among the wealthy, and secure that which money can purchase, it is not a vision to be encouraged. But there is a limited sense in which the dream of prosperity is not unworthy. If a young fellow starting his business career recognises that there are at least three possible courses open to him-
(1) To take always the line of least resistance, and thus to be classed with the great crowd that is to be rated at a current market value for the particular type of labour of which he is capable; or
(2) so to devote himself to the details and affairs of his special calling as to make himself of more value than the average employee, and thus to secure a better financial return for his services, a larger respect from his comrades in toil, and the inward satisfaction of something attempted, something done; or
(3) to so further devote himself to his toil as by the concentration of all his energies, the insight of a quicker intelligence, the application of brains to the problems of commerce, and the possession of the rare gift of recognising an opportunity, coupled with the courage to seize it, he may rise to the front rank of the army of commerce; then I say that the settled determination to take according to his ability either the second or third of these courses, and the dream of legitimate prosperity resulting therefrom, is by no means to be condemned or discouraged. But, young men, let me say to you two things, and do you give them careful thought.
(1) In the pursuit of business success many perils are to be encountered; keep a sensitive conscience, and do not purchase gain at the price of guilt. And
(2) Keep in mind the fact that no amount of business success alone can ever be regarded as leading to a complete and worthy life in the sight of God. The world passeth away, and the desire thereof; but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
II. Dreams of service. Probably some of you cherish dreams that do not revolve around self-interest. You want to live so that, amid the forces that make the conditions of life easier for humanity at large, your life and influence may find a place. The details of your dream may vary, whilst the aim of it may be the same. If in any sense this be your dream, it is a glorious one. Let me confirm you therein by recalling the wise words that tell us that he that serves his fellow-men receives honour from God.
III. Dreams of reform. Society must be remodelled; a saner idea of life must be presented to the people; the value of the worker must be recognised; the inalienable right of every individual to the means of subsistence taught, and the lavish waste of the non-producer, the parasite upon the body corporate, sturdily, and if need be forcefully, restrained. By all means recognise the current evils of the day, and, according to your knowledge and opportunity, work for the betterment of all. But at the same time do not let your recognition of wrong lead you to unfair and unjust conclusions; do not indulge in hasty generalisations; do not condemn where no condemnation is deserved, and try honestly to grasp all the facts that go to form the problem in its completeness. Any school-boy will tell you that no problem can be correctly solved if, in your attempted solution, you disregard essential factors. Nor forget that if we could secure to-morrow the equal advantage and opportunity for all that we so desire, the inequalities of to-day would be repeated within a generation. Then to you I say, Do not put away as idle these fair dreams, but rather learn how they may end in realisation. Spend your energies in resisting abuses, in working for all schemes of worthy reform, but do not forget that the sinfulness of the human heart will militate against their success, and that the heart finds renewal in the power that comes from Calvary, and in that alone.
IV. Dreams of character. For of this I am confident, that in your dreams you have fair visions of a life controlled by loftiest principle, and by highest ideals, not only of that which you are to do, but also of that which you are to be. It is the noble and almost instinctive hatred of the unreal, the sham and the merely conventional, that makes many a young man so severe and uncompromising a critic of the conduct of others; he makes no allowances, for he does not see that honesty requires that any should be made. As years pass our judgments become kindlier. But this is not the point just now; rather this, that the young man has a splendid ideal of character, a sense of non-attainment, and a dream of future realisation. Herein we wish him God-speed; woe to the man who dares to discourage this hope. Only listen while I give you this from the experience of men of all ages. Character is of slow growth; it is the product of a long process, the issue of much stern conflict. The saint is grown, not made, and the stronger and more valuable growths are always slew; an oak takes many years to mature. As you advance in attainment your ideal will advance in its requirements, so that it will ever be, Not as though I had already attained; but of this be sure, every year shall bring the richer graces, the kindlier tempers, the fuller satisfaction of the Christlike character, and you shall realise that these dreams of your youth were not only dreams, but also prophecies. (J. W. Butcher.)
Visions of God
(with Joe 2:8; Hab 2:2; Isa 6:5):–This is one of the first results of the pentecostal baptism. The young men, the hardened and practical members of the community who look at everything from a commonsense and business standpoint, shall see visions. It will not make them visionary. They will find in their vision of God the secret of purity and strength and fidelity. But where shall we see visions? Not by gazing, into the heavens, but by reading our Bibles. So the prophet Habakkuk says, Write the vision, and make it plain upon tables. This is the great purpose of the Bible. The daily paper opens a window into the world around us, and we see the craft and cunning, the violence and deceit, the strifes and jealousies of men. But the Bible opens a window into heaven, and reveals to us, the love and goodness and power of God. Have you seen the vision? It is so plain that he who reads may run. Nay, you must not run past it. That is the sin of this hurrying pleasure-loving age. Men will not give themselves time to take in the vision of life. But he who reads will have to run. There will be no loitering then. The vision will fire your soul with such Divine enthusiasm that you will run off to make known what you have seen. Have you seen the vision? The prophet adds, though it tarry, wait for it! Yes, indeed, for you are of no use in the world until you have seen it. It is the men who have seen God that are a blessing to others. Esau lacked this vision, and it led him to sell his birthright. The birthright meant spiritual blessing. That is why Esau is called a profane man. The bargain he struck was not only a foolish one; it was a profane one. He sold his birthright because he despised it. But when you have seen God and the opened heaven, your birthright, i.e., your right through the atoning sacrifice to become a son of God and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven, outweighs all the pleasures of sin, and it becomes easy for you to keep first things first. It was this which made Joseph so steadfast. In his youth God gave him dreams; they were not the result of indigestion, but visions of the night. His father had already given him as a special token of his love a coat of many colours. It was notsurely a mere piece of favouritism. The coat was the outward sign of that supremacy which the dreams indicated, and which probably had already been made known to Jacob. Jacob knew the misery that had resulted in the home of his childhood, where the judgment of God choosing the younger before the elder had not been accepted by Isaac his father, and mother and son stooped to falsehood and trickery in order to bring about the counsels of God. So Jacob determined that in his household Gods purpose should be known and accepted from the first, and he gave to Joseph this robe of honour. The garment stood then for two things, for royalty and purity. Joseph had his visions, because he was a kingly soul, and of a pure heart. And the effect of these visions is seen all through his future life. That is the necessary result of the vision of God. It dwarfs everything else. It reduces to their true proportions the circumstances of daily life. God never changes. God is working His purpose out. The man who trusts in God will never be confounded. The pit, the slave market, the prison cell may lie before us, but these are only for a time. In the long run Gods blessing prevails even in this topsy-turvy world, and the blessing of the Lord it maketh rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it. But the first result of the vision of God is an overwhelming sense of sin. This is the distinguishing characteristic of the men who have seen God. There is about them a depth, a solemnity, a reverence, a brokenness of soul. Yes, though the immediate effect is an overwhelming sense of sin, you will not be left crushed and overcome. Isaiah received the sacrament of cleansing, the live coal from the altar. To John came the reassuring touch and the strengthening word, Fear not, I am He. Christ knows how to bring His servants over from the despair that comes from the knowledge of self into the rest of faith that comes from the knowledge of God. There is no remedy for our sinfulness in ourselves. No, the transformation is wrought not by the discovery of any saving merit or qualification in ourselves, but by a clearer revelation of Jesus Christ. A new view of Jesus, a fresh vision of God, is the secret of all blessing. This made Jacob the supplanter a prince with God, this gave Joshua the victory over Jericho and the king thereof and the mighty men of valour; this enabled Elisha to go in and out throughout Israel as a holy man of God, never faint-hearted, never discouraged, never at a loss, able even when shut in by the Syrians on every side to use the reckoning of faith and reply to his terrified servant, Fear not, for they that be with us are more than they that be with them. Yes, patience, courage, cheerfulness, strength, all belong to the men who see God. (F. S. Webster, M. A.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 28. Shall come to pass afterward] acharey ken, “after this;” the same, says Kimchi, as in the latter days, which always refers to the days of the Messiah; and thus this prophecy is to be interpreted: and we have the testimony of St. Peter, Ac 2:17, that this prophecy relates to that mighty effusion of the Holy Spirit which took place after the day of pentecost. Nor is there any evidence that such an effusion took place, nor such effects were produced, from the days of this prophet till the day of pentecost. And the Spirit was poured out then upon all flesh, that is, on people of different countries, speaking the languages of almost all the people of the earth; which intimated that these were the first-fruits of the conversion of all the nations of the world. For there was scarcely a tongue in the universe that was not to be found among the Parthians, Medes, Elamites, Mesopotamians, Jews, Cappadocians, people of Pontus, of Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, Libya, Cyrene, Rome, Crete, and Arabia, who were residents at Jerusalem at that time; and on whom this mighty gift was poured out, each hearing and apprehending the truths of the Gospel, in his own language wherein he was born. Thus we have Divine authority for saying, that was the fulfilment of this prophecy by Joel. And the mighty and rapid spread of the Gospel of Christ in the present day, by means of the translation of the Scriptures into almost all the regular languages of the world, and the sending missionaries to all nations, who preach the Gospel in those tongues, are farther proofs that the great promise is in the fullest progress to be speedily fulfilled, even in the utmost sense of the words.
Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy] Shall preach-exhort, pray, and instruct, so as to benefit the Church.
Your old men shall dream dreams] Have my will represented to them in this way, as the others by direct inspiration.
Your young men shall see visions] Have true representations of Divine things made upon their imaginations by the power of God; that they shall have as full an evidence of them as they could have of any thing that came to the mind through the medium of the senses.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
It shall come to pass, most certainly this shall be done, afterward; in the latter days, after the return out of Babylonish captivity, after the various troubles and salvations by which they may know that I am the Lord, their God in the midst of them, when those wondrous works shall be seconded by the most wonderful of all, the sending the Messiah, in his day and under his kingdom.
I will pour out my Spirit; in large abundant measures will I give my Holy Spirit, which the Messiah exalted shall send, Joh 16:7; in extraordinary power and gifts in the apostles and first preachers of the gospel, and in ordinary measure and graces to all believers, Eph 4:8-11.
Upon all flesh; before these gifts were confined to a few people, to one particular nation, to a very small people; but now they shall be enlarged to all nations, Act 2:33; 10:45, to all that believe, all that are regenerate.
Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy: this was in part fulfilled according to the letter in the first days of the gospel; but this promise is rather of a comparative meaning, thus, By pouring out of the Holy Spirit on your sons and your daughters, they shall have as clear and full knowledge of the deep mysteries of Gods law as prophets beforetime had. The law and prophets were till John, and during this time the gifts of the Spirit were given in lesser measures, and of all men the prophets had greatest measures of the Spirit; but in these days, the least in the kingdom of God is greater than John.
Your old men shall dream dreams; no difference of age, to old men who had been long blind in the things of God the mysteries of grace shall be revealed, and these shall know as certainly and clearly as if God had extraordinarily revealed himself to them by dreams sent of God upon them.
Your young men shall see visions; many young men shall be as eminent in knowledge as if the things known were communicated by vision. In a word, all knowledge of God and his will shall abound among all ranks, sexes, and ages in the Messiahs days, and not only equal, but surpass, all that formerly was by prophecy dreams, or visions.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
28. afterward“in thelast days” (Isa 2:2) underMessiah after the invasion and deliverance of Israel from thenorthern army. Having heretofore stated the outward blessings,he now raises their minds to the expectation of extraordinaryspiritual blessings, which constitute the true restoration of God’speople (Isa 44:3). Fulfilled inearnest (Ac 2:17) on Pentecost;among the Jews and the subsequent election of a people among theGentiles; hereafter more fully at the restoration of Israel (Isa 54:13;Jer 31:9; Jer 31:34;Eze 39:29; Zec 12:10)and the consequent conversion of the whole world (Isa 2:2;Isa 11:9; Isa 66:18-23;Mic 5:7; Rom 11:12;Rom 11:15). As the Jews have beenthe seedmen of the elect Church gathered out of Jews and Gentiles,the first Gospel preachers being Jews from Jerusalem, so they shallbe the harvest men of the coming world-wide Church, to be set up atMessiah’s appearing. That the promise is not restricted to thefirst Pentecost appears from Peter’s own words: “The promise is(not only) unto you and to your children, (but also) to all thatare afar off (both in space and in time), even as many as theLord our God shall call” (Ac2:39). So here “upon all flesh.”
I will pour outunder the new covenant: not merely, let fall drops, asunder the Old Testament (Joh 7:39).
my spiritthe Spirit”proceeding from the Father and the Son,” and at the sametime one with the Father and the Son (compare Isa11:2).
sons . . . daughters . . .old . . . youngnot merely on a privileged few (Nu11:29) as the prophets of the Old Testament, but men of all agesand ranks. See Act 21:9; 1Co 11:5,as to “daughters,” that is, women, prophesying.
dreams . . . visions(Act 9:10; Act 16:9).The “dreams” are attributed to the “old men,” asmore in accordance with their years; “visions” to the”young men,” as adapted to their more lively minds. Thethree modes whereby God revealed His will under the Old Testament (Nu12:6), “prophecy, dreams, and visions,” are here madethe symbol of the full manifestation of Himself to all His people,not only in miraculous gifts to some, but by His indwelling Spirit toall in the New Testament (Joh 14:21;Joh 14:23; Joh 15:15).In Act 16:9; Act 18:9,the term used is “vision,” though in the night, not adream. No other dream is mentioned in the New Testament savethose given to Joseph in the very beginning of the New Testament,before the full Gospel had come; and to the wife of Pilate, a Gentile(Mat 1:20; Mat 2:13;Mat 27:19). “Prophesying”in the New Testament is applied to all speaking under theenlightenment of the Holy Spirit, and not merely to foretellingevents. All true Christians are “priests” and “ministers”of our God (Isa 61:6), and havethe Spirit (Eze 36:26; Eze 36:27).Besides this, probably, a special gift of prophecy andmiracle-working is to be given at or before Messiah’s coming again.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And it shall come to pass afterward,…. After the teacher of righteousness has been sent, and a plentiful rain of the Gospel has been let down in the land of Judea, in the ministry of John the Baptist, Christ and his apostles, and such a comfortable enjoyment of the blessings of grace in it, and the knowledge of God by it; and after the wonderful work of redemption wrought by Christ. R. Jeshua in Aben Ezra and Jarchi both say this prophecy refers to time to come; and Kimchi observes, that the phrase is the same with “in the last days”; and so the Apostle Peter quotes it, Ac 2:17; a phrase, as the above writer observes, which always signifies the days of the Messiah, to which he applies these words; and so do other Jewish writers, both ancient and modern o; and there is no doubt with us Christians that they belong to the times of Christ and his apostles, since they are by an inspired writer said to be fulfilled in those times, Ac 2:16; here some begin a new chapter;
[that] I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; not on such whose hearts are made tender as flesh, according to Eze 36:26; as Jarchi; for the Spirit must be given first to make the heart such; nor only upon men in the land of Israel, a place fit to prophesy in, as Aben Ezra and Kimchi; but upon all men, as this phrase frequently signifies; see Isa 40:5; that is, all sorts of men, Jews and Gentiles, men of all nations; and such there were on the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit was poured down upon the apostles, and the grace of the Spirit was given to many of all nations; though that was only the beginning of the fulfilment of this prophecy, which quickly had a further accomplishment in the Gentile world; and denotes the abundance of the gifts of the Spirit, both extraordinary and ordinary, and of his grace, and the blessings of it, bestowed on them;
and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy; as Agabus, Barnabas, Simeon, c. and the four daughters of Philip the evangelist,
Ac 11:28
your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions; as Ananias, Peter, Paul, John, and others, some in their elder, some in their younger years, Ac 9:10; though prophecy, dreams, and visions, being the usual ways of conveying knowledge, here signify that the knowledge of men in Gospel times should be equal to, yea, exceed, whatever was communicated to men in the highest degree in former times: John the Baptist was greater than any of the prophets, and yet the least in the kingdom of heaven was greater than he, Lu 7:28.
o Zohar in Numb. fol. 99. 2. Bemidbar Rabba, sect. 15. fol. 219. 2. Debarim Rabba, sect. 6. fol. 242. 2. Abarbinel, Mashmia Jeshua, fol. 9. 3. R. Isaac, Chizzuk Emunah, par. 1. p. 51.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(Heb. ch. 3). Outpouring of the Spirit of God, and Announcement of Judgment. (Note: Among other special expositions of these verses, see Hengstenberg’s Christology, vol. i. p. 326ff. translation.)
Joe 2:28. “And it will come to pass afterwards, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, and your young men see visions. Joe 2:29. And also upon the men-servants and maid-servants I will put out my Spirit in those days.” As ‘achare – khen points back to bari’shon in Joe 2:23, the formula v e hayah achare – khen describes the outpouring of the Spirit as a second and later consequence of the gift of the teacher for righteousness. , to pour out, signifies communication in rich abundance, like a rain-fall or water-fall. For the communication of the Spirit of God was not entirely wanting to the covenant nation from the very first. In fact, the Spirit of God was the only inward bond between the Lord and His people; but it was confined to the few whom God endowed as prophets with the gift of His Spirit. This limitation was to cease in the future.
(Note: “There is no doubt that the prophet promises something greater here than the fathers had experienced under the law. We know that the grace of the Holy Spirit flourished even among the ancient people; but the prophet promises here not what the faithful had formerly experienced, but something greater. And this may be gathered from the verb ‘to pour’ which he employs. For does not mean merely to give in drops, but to pour out in great abundance. But God did not pour out the Holy Spirit so abundantly or copiously under the law, as He has since the manifestation of Christ.” – Calvin.)
What Moses expressed as a wish – namely, that the people were all prophets, and the Lord would put His Spirit upon them (Num 11:29) – was to be fulfilled in the future. Ruach Y e hovah is not the first principle of the physico-creaturely life (i.e., not equivalent to ruach Elohm in Gen 1:2), but that of the spiritual or ethical and religious life of man, which filled the prophets under the Old Testament as a spirit of prophecy; consequently Joel describes its operations under this form. “All flesh” signifies all men. The idea that it embraces the irrational animals, even the locusts (Credner), is rejected with perfect justice by Hitzig as an inconceivable thought, and one unheard-of in the Bible; but he is wrong in adding that the Old Testament does not teach a communication of the Spirit of God to all men, but limits it to the people of Israel. A decided protest is entered against this by Gen 6:3, where Jehovah threatens that He will no longer let His Spirit rule ba’adam , i.e., in the human race, because it has become basar (flesh). Basar , as contrasted with ruach Y e hovah , always denotes human nature regarded as incapacitated for spiritual and divine life. Even in this verse we must not restrict the expression “all flesh” to the members of the covenant nation, as most of the commentators have done; for whatever truth there may be in the remark made by Calovius and others (compare Hengstenberg, Christol. i. p. 328 transl.), that the following clause, “your sons, your daughters, your old men, your young men, and men-servants and maid-servants,” contains a specification of , it by no means follows with certainty from this, that the word all does not do away with the limitation to one particular nation, but merely that in this one nation even the limits of sex, age, and rank are abolished; since it cannot be proved that the specification in Joe 2:2 and Joe 2:3 is intended to exhaust the idea of “all flesh.” Moreover, as the prophecy of Joel had respect primarily to Judah, Joel may primarily have brought into prominence, and specially singled out of the general idea of kol – basar in Joe 2:28 and Joe 2:29, only those points that were of importance to his contemporaries, viz., that all the members of the covenant nation would participate in this outpouring of the Spirit, without regard to sex, age, or rank; and in so doing, he may have looked away from the idea of the entire human race, including all nations, which is involved in the expression “all flesh.” We shall see from Joe 2:32 that this last thought was not a strange one to the prophet. In the specification of the communication of the Spirit, the different forms which it assumes are rhetorically distributed as follows: to the sons and daughters, prophesying is attributed; to the old, dreams; to the young, sights or visions. But it by no means follows from this, that each of these was peculiar to the age mentioned. For the assertion, that the Spirit of God only manifests itself in the weakened mind of the old man by dreams and visions of the night; that the vigorous and lively fancy of the youth or man has sights by day, or true visions; and lastly, that in the soul of the child the Spirit merely works as furor sacer Tychs., Credner, Hitzig, and others), cannot be historically sustained. According to Num 12:6, visions and dreams are the two forms of the prophetic revelation of God; and is the most general manifestation of the prophetic gift, which must not be restricted to the ecstatic state associated with the prophesying. The meaning of this rhetorical individualizing, is simply that their sons, daughters, old persons, and youths, would receive the Spirit of God with all its gifts. The outpouring of the Spirit upon slaves (men-servants and maidens) is connected by v e gam , as being something very extraordinary, and under existing circumstances not to be expected. Not a single case occurs in the whole of the Old Testament of a salve receiving the gift of prophecy. Amos, indeed, was a poor shepherd servant, but not an actual slave. And the communication of this gift to slaves was irreconcilable with the position of slaves under the Old Testament. Consequently even the Jewish expositors could not reconcile themselves to this announcement. The lxx, by rendering it , have put servants of God in the place of the slaves of men; and the Pharisees refused to the even a knowledge of the law (Joh 7:49). The gospel has therefore also broken the fetters of slavery.
Judgment upon all nations goes side by side with the outpouring of the Spirit of God. Joe 2:30. “And I give wonders in the heavens and on earth, blood, fire, and pillars of smoke. Joe 2:31. The sun will turn into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the day of Jehovah, the great and terrible (day), comes. Joe 2:32. And it comes to pass, every one who shall call upon the name of Jehovah will be saved; for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem will be fugitives, as Jehovah hath said, and among those that are left will be those whom Jehovah calls.” With the word , Joe 2:3 is attached to Joe 2:2 as a simple continuation (Hitzig). The wonders which God will give in the heavens and upon earth are the forerunners of judgment. Moph e thm (see at Exo 4:21) are extraordinary and marvellous natural phenomena. The wonders on earth are mentioned first, in Joe 2:30; then in Joe 2:31 those in the heavens. Blood and fire recal to mind the plagues which fell upon Egypt as signs of the judgment: the blood, the changing of the water of the Nile into blood (Exo 7:17); the fire, the balls of fire which fell to the earth along with the hail (Exo 9:24). Blood and fire point to bloodshed and war. Timroth ashan signifies cloud-pillars (here and in Son 3:6), whether we regard the form timroth as original, and trace it to timrah and the root tamar , or prefer the reading , which we meet with in many codices and editions, and take the word as a derivative of yamar = mur , as Hengstenberg does ( Christol. i. p. 334 transl.). This sign has its type in the descent of Jehovah upon Sinai, at which the whole mountain smoked, and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a smelting-furnace (Exo 19:18). We have not to think, therefore, of columns of cloud ascending from basons of fire, carried in front of caravans or armies on the march to show the way (see at Son 3:6), but of pillars of cloud, which roll up from burning towns in time of war (Isa 9:17). Joe 2:31. In the heavens the sun is darkened, and the moon assumes a dull, blood-red appearance. These signs also have their type in the Egyptian plague of darkness (Exo 10:21.). The darkening and extinction of the lights of heaven are frequently mentioned, either as harbingers of approaching judgment, or as signs of the breaking of the day of judgment (it was so in Joe 2:2, Joe 2:10, and is so again in Joe 3:14: see also Isa 13:10; Isa 34:4; Jer 4:23; Eze 32:1-8; Amo 8:9; Mat 24:29; Mar 13:24; Luk 21:25). What we have to think of here, is not so much periodically returning phenomena of nature, or eclipses of the sun and moon, as extraordinary (not ecliptic) obscurations of the sun and moon, such as frequently occur as accompaniments to great catastrophes in human history.
(Note: Compare O. Zoeckler, Theologia Natural. i. p. 420, where reference is made to Humboldt ( Kosmos, iii. 413-17), who cites no fewer than seventeen extraordinary cases of obscuration of the sun from the historical tradition of past ages, which were occasioned, not by the moon, but by totally different circumstances, such as diminished intensity in the photosphere, unusually large spots in the sun, extraneous admixtures in our own atmosphere, such as trade-wind dust, inky rain, and sand rain, etc.; and many of which took place in most eventful years, such as 45 b.c., a.d. 29 (the year of the Redeemer’s death), 358, 360, etc.)
And these earthly and celestial phenomena are forerunners and signs of the approaching or bursting judgment; not only so far as subjective faith is concerned, from the impression which is made upon the human mind by rare and terrible phenomena of nature, exciting a feeling of anxious expectation as to the things that are about to happen,
(Note: Calvin has taken too one-sided and subjective a view of the matter, when he gives the following explanation of Joe 2:31: “What is said here of the sun and moon – namely, that the sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood – is metaphorical, and signifies that the Lord will fill the whole universe with signs of His wrath, which will paralyze men with fear, as if all nature were changed into a thing of horror. For just as the sun and moon are witnesses of the paternal favour of God towards us, while they give light in their turns to the earth, so, on the other hand, the prophet affirms that they will be the heralds of an angry and offended God…. By the darkness of the sun, the turning of the moon into blood, and the black vapour of smoke, the prophet meant to express the thought, that wherever men turned their eyes, everywhere, both above and below, many things would meet the eye that would fill them with terror. So that it is just as if he had said, that there had never been such a state of misery in the world, nor so many fierce signs of the wrath of God.” For example, the assertion that they “are metaphorical expressions” cannot possibly be sustained, but is at variance with the scriptural view of the deep inward connection between heaven and earth, and more particularly with the scriptural teaching, that with the last judgment the present heavens and present earth will perish, and the creation of a new heaven and a new earth will ensue. Moreover, the circumstance that a belief in the significance of these natural phenomena is met with in all nations, favours their real (not merely imaginary) connection with the destinies of humanity.)
but also in their real connection with the onward progress of humanity towards its divinely appointed goal, which may be explained from the calling of man to be the lord of the earth, though it has not yet received from science its due recognition and weight; in accordance with which connection, they show “that the eternal motion of the heavenly worlds is also appointed by the world-governing righteousness of God; so that the continued secret operation of this peculiar quality manifests itself through a strong cosmico-uranian symbolism, in facts of singular historical significance” (Zoeckler, l. c.).
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| Promise of Mercy. | B. C. 720. |
28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: 29 And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my spirit. 30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. 31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come. 32 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.
The promises of corn, and wine, and oil, in the foregoing verses, would be very acceptable to a wasted country; but here we are taught that we must not rest in those things. God has reserved some better things for us, and these verses have reference to those better things, both the kingdom of grace and the kingdom of glory, with the happiness of true believers in both. We are here told,
I. How the kingdom of grace shall be introduced by a plentiful effusion of the Spirit, (Joe 2:28; Joe 2:29). We are not at a loss about the meaning of this promise, nor in doubt what it refers to and wherein it had its accomplishment, for the apostle Peter has given us an infallible explication and application of it, assuring us that when the Spirit was poured out upon the apostles, on the day of Pentecost (Acts ii. 1, c.), that was the very thing which was spoken of here by the prophet Joel,Joe 2:16Joe 2:17. That was the gift of the Spirit, which, according to this prediction, was to come, and we are not to look for any other, any more than for another accomplishment of the promise of the Messiah. Now, 1. The blessing itself here promised is the pouring out of the Spirit of God, his gifts, graces, and comforts, which the blessed Spirit is the author of. We often read in the Old Testament of the Spirit of the Lord coming by drops, as it were, upon the judges and prophets whom God raised up for extraordinary services; but now the Spirit shall be poured out plentifully in a full stream, as was promised with an eye to gospel-times, Isa. xliv. 3. I will pour my Spirit upon thy seed. 2. The time fixed for this is afterwards; after the fulfilling of the foregoing promises this shall be fulfilled. St. Peter expounds this of the last days, the days of the Messiah, by whom the world was to have its last revelation of the divine will and grace in the last days of the Jewish church, a little before its dissolution. 3. The extent of this blessing, in respect of the persons on whom it shall be bestowed. The Spirit shall be poured out upon all flesh, not as hitherto upon Jews only, but upon Gentiles also; for in Christ there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, Rom 10:11; Rom 10:12. Hitherto divine revelation was confined to the seed of Abraham, none but those of the land of Israel had the Spirit of prophecy; but, in the last days, all flesh shall see the glory of God (Isa. xl. 5) and shall come to worship before him, Isa. lxvi. 23. The Jews understand it of all flesh in the land of Israel, and Peter himself did not fully understand it as speaking of the Gentiles till he saw it accomplished in the descent of the Holy Ghost upon Cornelius and his friends, who were Gentiles (Act 10:44; Act 10:45), which was but a continuation of the same gift which was bestowed on the day of Pentecost. The Spirit shall be poured out upon all flesh, that is, upon all those whose hearts are made hearts of flesh, soft and tender, and so prepared to receive the impressions and influences of the Holy Ghost. Upon all flesh, that is, upon some of all sorts of men; the gifts of the Spirit shall not be so sparing, or so much confined, as they have been, but shall be more general and diffusive of themselves. (1.) The Spirit shall be poured out upon some of each sex. Not your sons only, but your daughters, shall prophesy; we read of four sisters in one family that were prophetesses, Acts xxi. 9. Not the parents only, but the children, shall be filled with the Spirit, which intimates the continuance of this gift for some ages successively in the church. (2.) Upon some of each age: “Your old men, who are past their vigour and whose spirits begin to decay, your young men, who have yet but little acquaintance with and experience of divine things, shall yet dream dreams and see visions;” God will reveal himself by dreams and visions both to the young and old. (3.) Upon those of the meanest rank and condition, even upon the servants and the handmaids. The Jewish doctors say, Prophecy does not reside on any but such as are wise, valiant, and rich, not upon the soul of a poor man, or a man in sorrow. But in Christ Jesus there is neither bond nor free, Gal. iii. 28. There were many that were called being servants (1 Cor. vii. 21), but that was no obstruction to their receiving the Holy Ghost. (4.) The effect of this blessing: They shall prophesy; they shall receive new discoveries of divine things, and that not for their own use only, but for the benefit of the church. They shall interpret scripture, and speak of things secret, distant, and future, which by the utmost sagacities of reason, and their natural powers, they could not have any insight into nor foresight of. By these extraordinary gifts the Christian church was first founded and set up, and the scriptures were written, and the ministry settled, by which, with the ordinary operations and influences of the Spirit, it was to be afterwards maintained and kept up.
II. How the kingdom of glory shall be introduced by the universal change of nature, Joe 2:30; Joe 2:31. The pouring out of the Spirit will be very comfortable to the righteous; but let the unrighteous hear this, and tremble. There is a great and terrible day of the Lord coming, which shall be ushered in with wonders in heaven and earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke, the turning of the sun into darkness and the moon into blood. This is to have its full accomplishment (as the learned Dr. Pocock thinks) in the day of judgment, at the end of time, before which these signs will be performed in the letter of them, yet so that it was accomplished in part in the death of Christ (which is called the judgment of this world, when the earth quaked and the sun was darkened, and a great and terrible day it was), and more fully in the destruction of Jerusalem, which was a type and figure of the general judgment, and before which there were many amazing prodigies, besides the convulsions of states and kingdoms prophesied of under the figurative expressions of turning the sun into darkness and the moon into blood, and the wars and rumours of wars, and distress of nations, which our Saviour spoke of as the beginning of these sorrows,Mat 24:6; Mat 24:7. But before the last judgment there will be wonders indeed in heaven and earth, the dissolution of both, without a metaphor. The judgments of God upon a sinful world, and the frequent destruction of wicked kingdoms by fire and sword, are prefaces to and presages of the judgment of the world in the last day. Those on whom the Spirit is poured out shall foresee and foretel that great and terrible day of the Lord, and expound the wonders in heaven and earth that go before it; for, as to his first coming, so to his second, all the prophets did and do bear witness, Rev. x. 7.
III. The safety and happiness of all true believers both in the first and second coming of Jesus Christ, v. 32. This speaks of particular persons, for to them the New Testament has more respect, and less to kingdoms and nations, than the Old. Now observe here, 1. That there is a salvation wrought out. Though the day of the Lord will be great and terrible, yet in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be deliverance from the terror of it. It is the day of the Lord, the day of his judgment, who knows how to separate between the precious and the vile. In the everlasting gospel, which went from Zion, in the church of the first-born typified by Mount Zion, and which is the Jerusalem that is from above, there is deliverance; a way of escaping the wrath to come is found out and laid open. Christ is himself not only the Saviour, but the salvation; he is so to the ends of the earth. This deliverance, laid up for us in the covenant of grace, is in performance of the promises made to the fathers. There shall be deliverance, as the Lord has said. See Luke i. 72. Note, This is ground of comfort and hope to sinners, that, whatever danger there is in their case, there is also deliverance, deliverance for them, if it be not their own fault. And, if we would share in this deliverance, we must ourselves apply to the gospel–Zion, to God’s Jerusalem. 2. That there is a remnant interested in this salvation, and for whom the deliverance is wrought. It is in that remnant (that is, among them) that the deliverance is, or in their souls and spirits; there are the earnests and evidences of it. Christ in you, the hope of glory. They are called a remnant, because they are but a few in comparison with the multitudes that are left to perish; a little remnant but a chosen one, a remnant according to the election of grace. And here we are told who they are that shall be delivered in the great day. (1.) Those that sincerely call upon God: Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, whether Jew or Gentile (for the apostle so expounds it, Rom. x. 13, where he lays this down as the great rule of the gospel by which we must all be judged), shall be delivered. This calling on God supposes knowledge of him, faith in him, desire towards him, dependence on him, and, as an evidence of the sincerity of all this, a conscientious obedience to him; for, without that, crying Lord, Lord, will not stand us in any stead. Note, It is the praying remnant that shall be the saved remnant. And it will aggravate the ruin of those who perish that they might have been saved on such easy terms. (2.) Those that are effectually called to God. The deliverance is sure to the remnant whom the Lord shall call, not only with the common call of the gospel, with which many are called that are not chosen, but with a special call into the fellowship of Jesus Christ, whom the Lord predestinates, or prepares, so the Chaldee. St. Peter borrows this phrase, Acts ii. 39. Note, Those only shall be delivered in the great day that are now effectually called from sin to God, from self to Christ, from things below to things above.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Promise Of The Spirit On All Flesh
Verses 28, 29:
Verse 28 describes the Holy Spirit empowering of the church for her testimony to all nations, of the Gentiles, which is declared to have occurred on the Great Pentecost, Act 2:16-18. This was after Israel and Judah’s return from the Babylonian captivity. The Holy Spirit seems to have been poured out upon, anointing or sanctifying the Jews only in Old Testament times; but with the empowering of the church, called from among the Gentiles, by our Lord, and established during His personal ministry, it was to be empowered by the special empowering and dedication on the first Pentecost, after the resurrection of our Lord, to preach the gospel to all nations, and all creatures thereafter, beginning at Jerusalem; The spirit fell, or was poured out upon “all flesh,” faces, people, when they were there in Jerusalem that Pentecost day, from three continents (Africa, Europe and Asia) and from 17 nations, Act 2:1-21; Mat 4:12-17; Joh 15:16; Joh 15:27; Act 10:37; Act 10:41; Act 10:44; Act 11:17; Act 15:13-15; 1Jn 2:20; 1Jn 2:26-27; Joh 14:16-17; Luk 24:46-49; Act 1:8. The special beginning, among the Jews, who became members of the early church of our Lord is described Act 9:10-19; Act 10:3; Act 10:9-17; Act 16:9-10; Act 21:8-13.
Verse 29 reveals that Almighty God would by the outpouring of the Spirit upon “all flesh”, all races, and all nations, cleanse and elevate obedient believers, even lowly servants, freemen, 1Co 7:22, and despised handmaids, to positions of witnessing and service to Him. Such was recalled from the day of Pentecost forward, as certified Act 1:8; Act 2:1-21; Acts ch. 10, 21:8, 9, etc.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
We have explained why the Prophet began with earthly blessings. One may indeed think that this order is not regular; for Christ does not in vain remind us, that the kingdom of God ought to be first sought, and that other things shall be added in their place, (Mat 6:33😉 for food, and every thing that belongs to this frail life, are, as it were, additions to the spiritual life. But the Prophet designedly mentioned first the evidence of God’s favor in outward benefits; for we see how slow the perceptions of men are, and how slothful they are in seeking spiritual life. As, then, men rise to things above with so much difficulty, the Prophet makes use of the best helps; and we must indeed be dealt with as we usually deal with children. For as there is not so much discernment in them as to be influenced by reasons, we set before them what is suitable to their weak and simple comprehension; so the Prophet did; for he showed first that God would be kind to the Jews in food for the body, and having used this as a help, he then added, Afterwards I will pour my Spirit upon all flesh.
By these words the Prophet reminds us, that people act absurdly when they are satisfied with vanishing things, when they ask of God nothing more excellent than to be pampered like brute animals; for in what do the children of God differ from asses and dogs, except they aspire after spiritual life? The Prophet, then, after having set before them lower things, as though they were children, now brings before them a more solid doctrine, (for thus they were to be led,) and affords them a taste of the favor of God in its external signs. “Ascend, then, now,” he says, “to spiritual life: for the fountain is one and the same; though when earthly benefits occupy and engross your attention, ye no doubt pollute them. But God feeds you, not to fill and pamper you; for he would not have you to be like brute animals. Then know that your bodies are fed, and that God gives support to you, that ye may aspire after spiritual life; for he leads you to this as by the hand; be this then your object.” We now, then, understand why the Prophet did not at first speak of the spiritual grace of God; but he comes to it now. He began with temporal benefits, for it was needful that an untutored people should be thus led by degrees, that on account of their infirmity, sluggishness, and dullness, they might thus make better progress, until they understood that God would for this end be a Father to them.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES.]
Joe. 2:28-32. Afterward] These outward things are only a type of spiritual gifts, a prospect of richer blessings; and a grander dispensation is held out, a dispensation remarkable for the Holy Spirit, as its sign and substance. This gift shall be poured out in copious and refreshing showers upon all flesh, Jew and Gentile (Act. 10:44; Act. 11:17), upon servants and handmaids, the most degraded and despised (Act. 2:18). As the result, sons and daughters shall prophesy; dreams to the old and visions to the young; all shall know Divine things clearly.
Joe. 2:30-31.] These manifestations, full of joy to believers, will be menacing to unbelievers. This day of the Lord will be attended by convulsions on earth, prognostications in heaven; to Gods children, to all who call upon him, it will be a day of redemption; but these will be a remnant only. Seek to belong to it (Act. 2:40).
HOMILETICS
THE NEW DISPENSATION.Joe. 2:28-32
By a natural transition the prophet rises from the temporal to the spiritual, from showers of rain to the outpouring of the Spirit. One blessing first (Joe. 2:23), then afterward (Joe. 2:28) a second and greater blessing. The words have special reference to the new dispensation, the dispensation of the Spirit. There are three distinct features connected together: the outpouring of the Spirit, the judgment upon the ungodly world, and the salvation of a faithful few.
I. The outpouring of the Spirit. And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. The outward blessings were typical of extraordinary spiritual blessings. Joel felt the need of spiritual influence, and believed that it would bring true enlightenment. We have not only a supernatural prediction, but a gleam of his own pure spiritual life.
1. The extent of the communications. Upon all flesh. It was not to be confined within the narrow bounds of Judea, not limited to one, but extended to all races. It was to be given to the pious and to those deemed incapable of spiritual life.
(1) Without distinction of sex. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Not only parents, but children would receive this gift. Four sisters in one family were prophetesses (Act. 21:9) The young are capable of Divine teaching, and God has promised to continue his presence and propagate his word from one generation to another. All thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children.
(2) Without distinction of age. Your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions. God adapts his grace to the condition of men. The inexperienced and the infirm; extremes in life may possess it.
(3) Without distinction of rank. And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids. This was something unexpected and had never been seen before. Even the slaves, bondsmen and bondswomen, are to share in the gift. The lowest are exalted, and the gospel breaks the fetters of slavery. Prophecy, said the Jews, doth not reside except on the wise, and mighty, and rich; but the poor have the gospel preached unto them. In Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one.
2. The form of the communications. Shall prophesy, dream dreams, and see visions. These were the three modes by which God revealed his will to men in the O. T. days (Num. 12:6). They are physical rather than spiritual; do not necessarily involve renovation of moral nature, but are made the symbols of fuller manifestation of miraculous gifts to some, and the outpouring of the Spirit to all. Yet taking into account the effects of this outpouring, we have reason to find a spiritual meaning. The Spirit would burst through every barrier and quicken the energies of life in all classes. Men would have the power to see and apply the truth of God to the facts of human life, past, present, and future. Spiritual light would not be confined to a select few. Dreams and visions should be given to others, and the mysteries of salvation be proclaimed to all nations. By these gifts the Church is founded, the ministry taught, and the Scriptures expounded in all ages. Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.
II. The dreadful judgment. Judgment is connected with the outpouring of the Spirit. When God comes in the majesty of his power heaven and earth quakes. Each revelation of God prepares the way for another, says an author, until that last revelation of his love and of his wrath in the great day. I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth.
1. In the earth. Blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. Blood and fire were manifest in the plagues of Egypt, and smoke ascended like the smoke of a smelting-furnace in the descent of Jehovah on Sinai (Exo. 19:18). Pillars of cloud roll up from burning towns in times of war (Isa. 9:17).
2. In the heavens. The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood. The darkening and extinction of the lights of heaven are often mentioned as harbingers of approaching judgment (Isa. 13:10; Jer. 4:23; Eze. 32:1-8; Mat. 24:29). The language may be figurative to a certain extent; but strange phenomena in the physical creation have been observed to precede great catastrophes of the moral world. In the judgment on Jerusalem, Josephus tells of physical prodigies, massacres and conflagrations. Humboldt cites cases of remarkable obscuration of the sun, in very eventful years. But whether we understand the words naturally or symbolically, they teach that the judgment day does not come without warning.
1. Foreseen by Gods people. These signs have no terror for them. They call upon God, and find in Him that refuge of which Mount Zion was only a type.
2. Heeded by the penitent. For among those who do not pray to God, some shall be called from their sins to find peace and security in him. The remnant whom the Lord shall call.
3. Neglected by the ungodly. Understood and improved by right-minded persons; unheeded and often despised by enemies of God. Thus there is a gradual process of separation among men, a ripening for the great and terrible day of the Lord. Watch ye therefore and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man (Luk. 21:36).
HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES
Joe. 2:29. Pour out my Spirit. Pour out like a rain-fall, or water-fall. The Spirit was not entirely wanting in the nation before this; but the prediction indicates
1. A greater measure. Not merely drop by drop, but pour out in greater abundance.
2. A wider extent. Not confined to members of the covenant nation, but upon all flesh. This a great contrast to Gen. 6:3. This word flesh (bsr), as contrasted with the spirit, denotes human nature so sunk in bondage to its lower elements as to be incapable of spiritual life. But according to Joel, even this impenetrable flesh is to be penetrated by the Divine Spirit; even the natural man is to be transformed into a spiritual man; even the incorrigible are to be recovered to obedience [Cox].
In those days. This special truth connected with one special time, concerning which he knows little. The prophets sought diligently to know this time (1Pe. 1:10). Apostles evidently studied the prophet Joel; but how reluctant was Peter to learn, and how astonished beyond degree that God would pour out his Spirit upon the Gentiles. It needed, says one, an express revelation and direct command before he could be persuaded that all flesh meant more than Jewish flesh. So, often all our lives through, we have words in our mouths, and read and hear them, and yet their true, full meaning never strikes us. The truth is familiar to us, it is daily confessed and repeated by rote, but has never reached our hearts; then perhaps at length something wakens us up, and henceforward the truth is a living reality, influencing and moulding our lives (Joe. 2:30-31). Physical phenomena serve
1. To awaken mens minds from lethargy. They quicken attention and put them into attitudes of fear and expectation. Thus they urge repentance, and provide space for it to those who are induced to profit by them.
2. To prepare Gods people for approaching trouble. They stimulate prayer, hope, and effort. In deliverance from Egypt (Deu. 6:22); in the destruction of Jerusalem (Mat. 24:29); and before the final judgment, God displays signs and wonders to the joy of his people and the terror of his enemies.
Joe. 2:31. The terrible day.
1. Great in its nature. The last day. The end of time and the beginning of eternity.
2. Great in its design. To give to all their due. Great things will be done. Men judged, angels ranked, and all accounts settled.
3. Great in its bearings. Great to believers, terrible to unbelievers. Men separated and sent to their own place.
Call upon the name of the Lord. Implies right faith to call upon him as he is; right trust in him, leaning upon him; right devotion, calling upon him as he has appointed; right life, ourselves who call upon him being, or becoming, by his grace what he wills [Pusey].
Joe. 2:28-31. The gospel dispensation is characterized
1. By spirituality.
2. By liberty.
3. By power.
4. By expansiveness [Pulpit Analyst].
Shall be saved.
1. The danger. The word delivered means safety by escape. Those who should be saved, i.e. those who were escaping from perils imminent and terrible (Act. 2:47). The condition of the Church is often desperate; but that of the sinner is more desperate.
2. The Saviour. The Lord. None other than Jesus. For there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved (Act. 4:12; Act. 2:36).
3. The encouragement.
(1) Whosoever, Jew or Gentile. Thank God for that whosoever, said an aged person, for it includes me.
(2) As the Lord hath said. God has promised to save all that call upon him (Rom. 10:13).
4. The result. Those who are delivered are only a remnant, a part of the whole. History and Scripture confirm these words. In the flood and destruction of the cities of the plain; in the entrance into Canaan and the return from captivity; in the first preaching of the gospel and the destruction of Jerusalem, a remnant only was saved. One is tempted to ask with the disciples, Are there few to be saved? but the answer is, that has nothing to do with you. Strive ye.
The remnant saved. I. The blessing given. Salvation. Not merely promised, but actually given and cheerfully enjoyed, not in word, but in deed. Human beings redeemed and human nature renewed. II. The source from whence it comes. In mount Zion and in Jerusalem, i.e. from God himself who dwelt and was worshipped in these places. The Church is the place of safety, and where God may be most easily found. III. The method by which it is secured.
1. God calls men to him.
2. Men call upon God in prayer. One description is a counterpart of the other; both go together, one is the human, and the other the Divine side of salvation. Deliverance depends not upon the worshippers alone, but upon God also. Those only are saved whom God calls to himself, and who call upon or choose him to be their God. It is all of grace. God must first call by his grace; then we obey his call, and call upon him; and he has said, Call upon me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorify me. God accounts our salvation his own glory. The promise is unto you and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 2
Joe. 2:28-32. So large a promise naturally awakens inquiry. We ask, When was it or will it be fulfilled? Joel expected and saw a fulfilment of it in his day. The people saw God in the ordinances of the sanctuary, but not in the fields and laws of Nature. The beneficent order of Nature was interrupted. This was taken as a judgment, and led to repentance and recognition of God. Were not the same conditions repeated in St Peters time with the like results? The Jews came up to the temple to worship, but failed to see God manifest in the flesh. Judgment came upon them. They awoke to a consciousness of their sin, repented, and turned unto the Lord. The Spirit came down upon them, and this new accession of life was a judgment to the men of that generation, trying what manner of spirit they were of, revealing the evil spirit by which they were animated, who opposed themselves to the power and grace of God. None the less may we say, This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel, in every new crisis of the religious life, in a man, in the race, or in the world. In all ages the same sequence recurssin, judgment, repentance, a new spirit, and in this new spirit a new test and criterion to which men are brought, and by which they are either approved or condemned [Samuel Cox].
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
III. THE PURPOSE OF REPENTANCE (contd)
FUTURE BLESSINGS
(GOD PREPARING A NEW PEOPLE)
TEXT: Joe. 2:28-32
28
And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
29
and also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my Spirit.
30
And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.
31
The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of Jehovah cometh.
32
And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of Jehovah shall be delivered; for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those that escape, as Jehovah hath said, and among the remnant those whom Jehovah doth call.
QUERIES
a.
How will all flesh have the Spirit poured out upon them?
b.
When are we to look for a fulfillment of the wonders of blood and fire, and pillars of smoke?
c.
What does the prophet mean by saying that only those in mount Zion and Jerusalem will escape from the terrible day of the Lord be possible?
PARAPHRASE
And it will come to pass in the Messianic age, that I will no longer limit the blessings of the Holy Spirit to a specific race and to certain people within that race but I will pour out the blessings of my Spirit upon all races of people who believe in Me; the Spirit will come to old and young, to man-slaves and women-slaves alike and they will all proclaim that God has revealed Himself. At the end of this Messianic age will come the great and terrible day of the Lord but before that day comes I will demonstrate its coming over and over again by showing portents of its coming through terrifying wonders in the heavens and in the earth; wars, natural disasters and fearful phenomena in nature. And then it will come to pass that Gods covenant promise made to Abraham will be vindicated and fulfilled for whosoever, whether he be Jew or Gentile, shall believe and obey Jehovah will be delivered from the great and terrible day of the Lord. In the new covenant city, where the Messianic presence of God dwells, will be found those who have escaped even as Jehovah has said, and the Messianic remnant are those whom Jehovah calls.
SUMMARY
With one dramatic sweep of the brush this prophet-artist has graphically portrayed the entire scope of the Messianic age from its beginning with the pouring out of the Spirit, to the working of God during this age in fearful phenomena calling men to repent, to the conclusion of the age at the great and terrible day of Jehovah.
COMMENT
Joe. 2:28-29 . . . AFTERWARD . . . I WILL POUR OUT MY SPIRIT UPON ALL FLESH . . . SONS AND DAUGHTERS SHALL PROPHESY . . . OLD MEN . . . YOUNG MEN . . . SERVANTS AND . . . HANDMAIDS . . . Although a veil of discontinuity obscures this whole section (Joe. 2:28-32), the ideas in the prophecy are definite. It is the time element, the near and the distant blended into one picture, which is temporarily disconcerting.
The inspired pronouncement as to the fulfillment of this prophecy is the final authority. There can be no question that Joels prophecy began to have its fulfillment on the day of Pentecost as recorded in Acts 2, for the inspired apostle declares it to be so. In the Old Dispensation particular members of the covenant people received special dispensations of the Spirit, but in the New, Messianic Dispensation, the Spirit would be poured out on people of all races, as many as would call upon the name of the Lord. Calling on the name of the Lord is, of course, synonymous with believing, repenting and obeying in baptism as is shown in Act. 22:16 when Paul was exhorted to call on His name by being baptized! In other words, Joel says that all who become Christian (who call upon the name of Jehovah) will receive the Spirit of God. Peter confirms it by saying Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For unto you is the promise and unto those who are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call unto Him. (Acts 2)
That this general giving of the Spirit to all believers was not to be accomplished until the establishment of the church is at once evident from the words in Joh. 7:38 . . . for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified . . . Peters words in Acts 2 also confirm the fact that this outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh was to continue even to those afar off (the Gentiles), even as many as God would call.
Joel specifically states that the Spirit will come without limitation as to age, sex or race. The only limitation is that those who expect to receive it must call upon the name of the Lord (Joe. 2:32). The outpouring of Gods Spirit upon slaves (servants and handmaids) is something extraordinary for not a single case occurs in the entire O.T. of a slave receiving the Spirit or gift of prophecy. Even the Jewish expositors could not reconcile themselves to this announcement. The translators of the Septuagint substituted servants of God in place of slaves of men in this text.
That these who have called upon the name of the Lord and have received the Spirit of God would prophesy, dream dreams and see visions could mean either of two things or both. It undoubtedly means that some in the Messianic age would receive special gifts of the Spirit to prophesy or to receive direct, infallible revelations of Gods will through dreams and visions, We know from the historical record of the New Testament that this is so. There were even some women who prophesied (Act. 21:9). But we believe the word prophesy is also used in a general sense to mean that all in the Messianic age who receive the gift of the Spirit will go everywhere preaching and teaching the revealed will of God (Act. 8:4). We do know from the figurative and hyperbolical usage of language in the Bible that it is not necessary to assume that when Joel says your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions . . . thus all who receive the indwelling presence of the Spirit and become Christians will be given direct dream or vision revelations from God. All who become Christians will receive the Spirit, but only some of the sons and daughters would receive the special, miraculous gifts of prophecy, visions, dreams, etc. If we let the New Testament interpret the Old Testament we will know what Joel means.
The important point of this passage is often missed in an effort to dogmatize or theologize about miraculous gifts of the Spirit. The important point is that in the latter days that is, in the Messianic age the fulfillment of Gods covenant promisesthe pouring out of His Spiritwould come to all people. It would no longer be a covenant restricted to a certain nation but to men of every tongue and tribe who would call upon Him in trustful obedience. God was going to do something unique in the Messianic age (Isa. 43:19) and this would be the pouring out of the Spirit from on high (Isa. 32:15)the creating of a new Spirit and a new heart within man (Eze. 11:19; Eze. 18:31; Eze. 36:26 ff; Eze. 37:1-28 and Zec. 12:10).
This outpouring of the Spirit of God, as Peter interprets it, ushers in the Messianic age. Furthermore, as Peter declares, all during this age, men of every race and station who call upon the name of the Lord will receive the indwelling Spirit. If we will but follow the inspired apostles interpretation we will see that Joels prophecy was not limited only to the special, miraculous gifts of the Spirit.
Joe. 2:30-32 AND I WILL SHOW WONDERS IN THE HEAVENS AND IN THE EARTH . . . BEFORE THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE DAY OF JEHOVAH COMETH . . . AND IT SHALL COME TO PASS, THAT WHOSOEVER SHALL CALL ON THE NAME OF JEHOVAH SHALL BE DELIVERED; . . . In highly figurative language Joel tells both the people of his day and all generations that during this entire Messianic age God will be showing wonders in the heavens and in the earth; blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. This, as is evident from the context, will be one of the means by which God will call men to repent in preparation for the great and terrible day of Jehovah. It is without question that these wonders are to transpire before that great and terrible day, so they must be before the second and final coming of Jesus Christ who comes on that terrible day to judge all who have not called upon the name of Jehovah. These wonders are both natural disasters and human holocausts. God certainly sent a warning upon an impenitent Jewish nation which had rejected the Messiah when He destroyed their city and their nation in 70 A.D. (cf. Mat. 24:1-28). God has also permitted nation after nation to be destroyed in blood, fire and smoke because of ungodliness. He has permitted the forces of the heavens (nature) to carry out His warning judgments upon the earth (cf. comments on Joe. 2:1 ff).
Then at the end of the ages, the great and terrible day of the Lord shall come (Joe. 2:31). God will call during the entire Christian age through Spirit filled men proclaiming His word and by sending terrifying wonders in the heavens and on the earth; and then suddenly, without warning the consummation of the ages.
For those who call upon the name of the Lord (Joe. 2:32) this day of the Lord will be one of deliverance. Their faith and their works will be vindicated. They shall receive an eternal weight of glory when they are recognized and glorified by God Himself. But for those who do not call upon His name in faith and obedience shall be His perfect, divine wrath.
Keil and Delitzschs statement here will help to clarify our interpretation:
For the signs in heaven and earth that are mentioned in Joe. 2:30-31 were to take place before the coming of the terrible day of the Lord, which would dawn after the outpouring of the Spirit of God upon all flesh, and which came, as history teaches, upon the Jewish nation that had rejected its Saviour on the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, and upon the Gentile world-power in the destruction of the Roman empire, and from that time forward breaks in constant succession upon one Gentile nation after another; until all the ungodly powers of this world shall be overthrown (cf. Ch. Joe. 3:2). On account of this internal connection between the day of Jehovah and the outpouring of the Spirit upon the church of the Lord, Peter also quoted Joe. 2:30-32 of this prophecy, for the purpose of impressing upon the hearts of all the hearers of his address the admonition, Save yourselves from this perverse generation (Act. 2:40), and also of pointing out the way of deliverance from the threatening judgment to all who were willing to be saved.
So Joel, blending the events of the Messianic age into one picture with the near and the distant painted like mountain peaks and ranges seen from a distance, does not portray for us the valleys of centuries of time between the mountain-top-events. This is what is called the shortened perspective of prophetic literature. It should caution us to pay more attention to what the prophets preach of the fundamentals of faith and practice and much less to what prophecy may seem to say about times and seasons.
In the Messianic age God intended to bless all who would answer His call in Christ Jesus with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. For it was in the New Testament dispensation that He set forth in Christ . . . a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. It is in Christ that men of all races have heard the word of truth, the gospel of . . . salvation, and have believed in him, and were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit . . . Yes, Ephesians, chapter one, is the completed revelation of that which Joel wrote in long ages past!
QUIZ
1.
When did the pouring out of the Spirit of God on all flesh take place? Is it still taking place?
2.
Does this promise of Joel mean that all Christians should expect to prophesy, receive revelations by dreams, and have visions? Why not?
3.
What and when are the wonders in heaven and on earth?
4.
How does God call the remnant?
5.
Why do we say it is not important that men should attempt to force these great mountain-top events into a rigid schedule of times and seasons?
6.
How is Ephesians I a completed revelation of this section of Joel?
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(28) I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh.Holy Scripture is itself the interpreter of this most weighty promise. St. Peters quotation and application of it in the Acts is its commentary. Afterward LXX., after these things becomes in the apostles mouthin the last daysi.e., in the Christian dispensation, when, after the punishment of the Jews by the heathen, their king camemy SpiritSt. Peter renders of my spirit, after the LXX., indicating the gifts and influences of the Holy Ghostupon all fleshi.e., without distinction of race or personthey of the circumcision were astonished because that on the Gentiles also was poured out the gift of the Holy Ghost. The outward manifestation of these gifts, as shown on the Day of Pentecost, in accordance with this prediction, was gradually withdrawn from the Church; the reality remains.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
Spiritual gifts to be bestowed in a more distant future, Joe 2:28-32 (Hebrew chap. 3).
This section takes us to a more distant future; how far is not stated. In addition to the temporal blessings promised for the immediate future (Joe 2:19-27), higher spiritual blessings are awaiting the people. The Spirit will be poured out upon them, so that the spiritual perception of all will be clarified and intensified (28, 29); and being in a new fellowship with Jehovah they have nothing more to fear. The day of Jehovah will come, inaugurated by extraordinary phenomena in nature (30, 31), but those who through the outpouring of the Spirit have become true children of God shall escape (32).
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
28. Afterward After the realization of the temporal prosperity. Not the expression used by other prophets (Isa 2:2; Mic 4:1). Joel seems to point to a date nearer than that suggested by the other expression, but he also leaves the exact time indefinite.
I will pour out “Shaphakh does not mean merely to give in drops, but to pour out in great abundance” (Calvin).
My spirit The spirit is the life principle in man, the invisible power to which all external actions must be traced. In a similar way all the visible manifestations of Jehovah, whatever the sphere, are caused by the Spirit of Jehovah: creation (Gen 1:2; Job 33:4); the endowment of Israel’s heroes with warlike energy and administrative power (Jdg 3:10; Jdg 11:29; compare Journal of Biblical Literature, xix, 1:140ff., and xxiii, Joe 1:13 ff.). It is, however, especially in the sphere of the ethical, the religious, and the spiritual that the Spirit is active. The Spirit produces the prophetic power in its lower and higher forms (1Sa 10:6; 1Sa 10:10 ; 1Sa 19:20; Isa 61:1, etc.); it inspires the high ethical and spiritual ideas and ideals of the prophets. Thus far the Spirit had been the possession of only a select few; in the afterward the limitation will be done away with. Moses had expressed the wish (Num 11:29), “Would that all Jehovah’s people were prophets, that Jehovah would put his Spirit upon them!” Of the realization of this wish in the future Joel is now convinced.
Upon all flesh A phrase used by the Hebrews sometimes in a wider sense, including all living creatures, both man and beast (Gen 6:13; Gen 7:15; Gen 9:11; Gen 9:15); at other times in a narrower sense, of mankind alone (Jer 25:31; Psa 65:2); here only mankind, since animals nowhere appear as recipients of the Divine Spirit and the following clause seems to exclude them. It is a further question, however, whether all mankind is included or whether the promise is to be limited to Israel. Keil argues for the former, yet it is more probable, judging from the context, that the prophet has in mind Israel only. The specifications of 28, 29 point in that direction, and the expectation of the destruction of all nations (chapter 3) decides the point in favor of Israel alone (compare Act 10:45). But while the outpouring is to be confined to Israel, within the nation no one is to be excluded; all are to become active organs of the divine revelation.
Shall prophesy shall dream dreams shall see visions No distinction will be made of sex, age, or position, but the prophet distinguishes between different methods in which the revelation is to be received and the prophetic gift to be exercised. He does not mean, however, that each of the methods is peculiar to the age with which it is connected. That the Spirit manifests itself to the weakened mind of the old man in dreams of the night, to the lively fancy of the youth and maiden in sights during the day that is, true visions and to the soul of the child, less able to resist, merely as a divine influence cannot be proved from the Bible. Visions and dreams are two forms in which prophetic revelation is imparted (Num 12:6). All that the prophet means with the specification is that “their sons, daughters, old persons, and youth would receive the Spirit of Jehovah with all its various gifts.”
Prophesy They will be able to do the work which in the past was limited to the prophets, they are to become “organs of divine revelations,” to make known to those outside of Israel the will of God. (For an excellent discussion of the inspiration and activity of the Hebrew prophets see Hastings’s Dictionary of the Bible, article “Prophecy and Prophets.”)
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
The Promise Of Great Spiritual Blessing Yet To Be ‘Poured Out’ And Portents Of Judgment To Come ( Joe 2:28-32 ).
And as a result of their restoration to Him through repentance and their turning to Him, He promised that once they had seen the fulfilment of these promises they would at some stage see the fulfilment of greater promises. For at some time in the future He would pour out on them His own Spirit (compare Isa 32:15; Isa 44:1-5), with the result that all God’s people, both young and old, master and servant, male and female, would become prophets. ‘All flesh’ does not signify ‘everyone’, whether in Israel or the world, but rather signifies people of all classes and levels so that no one will necessarily be excluded on account of status, as the words that follow make clear
And also at some time there will be apocalyptic signs, so that just as the skies and the heavenly lights had been darkened by the locusts (Joe 2:10), so will it then be darkened by God’s judgments on the world. The heavens and the earth would both contain portents of what He was about to do. On the earth blood (which it will be noted was singularly lacking from the judgment of the locusts), and fire, and pillars of smoke, a clear indication of warfare, violence and destruction of both earthly property and cities, and in the heavens the sun ‘turning into darkness’ (which could be caused by pillars of smoke, volcanic action, or great storm clouds), and the moon turning red like ‘blood’, (a phenomenon well known in Palestine when there were eclipses, and which could also be caused by a polluted atmosphere). And these would all be a warning of the coming of the final great and terrible Day of YHWH, of which the plagues of locusts had been a foretaste.
And in that day whoever calls on the Name of YHWH (as one who is a regular true worshipper of YHWH, one Who is called by YHWH) will be saved. Note that those who will be saved are only a remnant of those who face the final judgments, those whom YHWH calls, and this includes some who will escape in mount Zion and in Jerusalem, all this in accordance with the word of YHWH, for it will result from His word bringing about His will (compare Isa 55:10-13).
Analysis of Joe 2:28-32 .
And it will come about afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions, and also on the servants and on the handmaids, in those days will I pour out my Spirit (Joe 2:28-29).
And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke, the sun will be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of YHWH comes (Joe 2:30-31).
And it will come about that whoever will call on the name of YHWH will be delivered, for in mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape, as YHWH has said, and among the remnant those whom YHWH calls (Joe 2:32).
Note that in ‘a’ it will come about that the Spirit of YHWH will be poured out on all levels of people so that they become prophets and discerners of His ways, and in the parallel it will come about that all who reveal themselves as His by ‘calling on the Name of YHWH’ (a phrase signifying offering Him true worship) will be delivered as a result of the call of YHWH. Centrally in ‘b’ judgments will come upon the world as portrayed by portents in both earth and heaven.
Joe 2:28-29
‘And it will come about afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh,
And your sons and your daughters will prophesy,
Your old men will dream dreams,
Your young men will see visions,
And also on the servants and on the handmaids,
In those days will I pour out my Spirit.’
There is probably here a reminder of when YHWH poured out His Spirit (spoken of to Moses as ‘your spirit’, that is the spirit of prophecy, wisdom and leadership given to him by YHWH) on the seventy elders in the wilderness (Numbers 11). This expectancy of the pouring out of the Spirit on God’s people was clearly current in the 8th century BC. Compare Isa 32:15. Both Joel and Isa 44:1-5 see it as very much poured out on people in order to make them responsive towards YHWH. The purpose of the promise was as an assurance that one day all YHWH’s people would be endued with the Spirit and would experience spiritual gifts, because one thing was finally certain, and that is that YHWH would work among His people in full restoration.
‘Pour out.’ The word is regularly used of God pouring out his wrath, and indicates giving in full measure, but in this case of Himself. They are to receive YHWH’s own Spirit. It is used in Amo 5:8; Amo 9:10 of the pouring out of the rain, and in view of Isa 32:15; Isa 44:1-5; Isa 55:10-13 must surely also suggest that the coming of the Spirit is to be seen as like spiritual rain falling on His people to cause them to become fruitful.
‘On all flesh.’ That this is limited to God’s people is emphasised by the reference to YOUR sons and Your daughters, but the point is that within God’s people it will not be limited to anyone. All levels and genders of society will receive the Spirit. The idea that fleshly man was to receive the Spirit of YHWH is a breaking down in the difference between man and God. Previously man has enjoyed ‘the breath of God’ (Gen 2:7). Now he is to be imbued with His Spirit. This is God’s future intention for His people.
‘And your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions.’ The idea is to indicate that all will enjoy prophetic gifts (compare Num 12:6), not in order to delegate the gifts to some. It was recognised that prophets would have dreams and visions, and the servants and handmaids were not excluded. it is wrong to overemphasise the ecstatic nature of what will happen. God is not promising strange phenomena, but revelation and truth.
‘Afterwards’ (after His current restitution of the land) is a vague time reference and gives no indication of when this will take place. The giving of the Spirit would be anticipated after the Babylonian exile (Eze 36:24-27) and was promised in part to Zerubbabel (Zec 4:7), and to John the Baptist (Luk 1:15-17). It was fulfilled when the Coming One was ‘drenched with the Holy Spirit’ (compare Joh 3:24) as the One Who was the representative of the true Israel and would then drench others (Mat 3:11 and parallels; Joh 1:30-33). There can be no doubt that it was partially fulfilled on the Apostles during Jesus’ earthly ministry (inferred from Luk 11:13, and from Mat 12:38 and the success of the Apostles in doing so), was sealed in the Upper Room (Joh 20:22), and became a wider gift to the whole church at Pentecost (Acts 2), when ‘all flesh’ prophesied, which was thus the true fulfilment of Joel’s prophecy as Peter observed. And the Holy Spirit now possesses the true church not ‘as well as Israel’, but because they are the true Israel, that is the congregation of the true Israel established by Jesus Christ (Mat 16:18; Mat 21:43), the true Vine (Joh 15:1-6), the ‘Israel of God (Gal 6:16; Eph 2:11-22; 1Pe 2:9).
It will be noted that Joel does not directly link this pouring out of the Spirit directly to the portents which he then refers to. They will certainly follow it, but at no stated interval, and it is unquestionable that those portents have themselves been manifested at different times in history as a reminder that the great and terrible day of YHWH is coming. Indeed Peter saw them as partly fulfilled in the darkening of the sun while Jesus was dying, and the reddening of the moon which no doubt accompanied it, due to the strange weather conditions (the moon appears as blood red in Palestine on many occasions).
Joe 2:30-31
‘And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth,
Blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke,
The sun will be turned into darkness,
And the moon into blood,
Before the great and terrible day of YHWH comes.’
The loose connection with the previous verse (‘and’) gives no indication of time span. The real point that is being made is that the Spirit will be poured out, to be followed at some stage by portents of God’s final judgments. In other words God’s people will be well prepared before it comes. This promise results from the new renewal of the covenant resulting from the effects of the locus invasion. But there is also a warning here that the people must not think that all would go smoothly from then on. Mankind was such, and even His people were such, that judgments, and then final judgment, were inevitable. Thus the future would hold, both in the short term and the long term, times of blood and violence and destruction. It was in the nature of man. And in the same way the heavens would give their portents, portents which have been observed through the ages (see e.g. Isa 9:18; Isa 13:10; Isa 34:4 etc. We cannot just lump all these into ‘the end times’. They occurred in history ). The smoke and explosions of war, or of violent expulsions from volcanoes, or strange weather effects, have all resulted in a darkened sun and a blood coloured moon at different times. And men have always seen in these strange events portents of what is to come. All this would happen time and again as a reminder of the coming terrible Day of YHWH.
The pouring out of the Spirit of YHWH on His people would introduce a new creative situation whereby His people would become God-possessed, patently both flesh and Spirit, thus enhancing the old creation, it is therefore significant that this new act of creation should be seen as followed by portents and signs which are a reminder of God’s judgments on Egypt and His subsequent revelation of Himself to Israel (Exo 7:17; Exo 9:24; Exo 10:21-22; compare Exo 19:18). It was a reminder that in redeeming those whom He has created for Himself God must bring His judgments on the world.
All this will occur ‘before the great and terrible day of YHWH’. Like the plague of locusts that had just devastated Judah, it would all be a reminder of the coming Day of YHWH. But it would not itself be the Day of YHWH. Joel only knew that the world faced tumult before the end. He had no conception of how much tumult. As empire has rolled on after empire, and as the world faced has catastrophic situations, these ‘signs’ have been seen again and again. They express the tumult of the world and the catastrophic nature of events that occur, rather than being a specific sign of ‘the end times’.
Joe 2:32
‘And it will come about that whoever will call on the name of YHWH will be delivered,
For in mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape,
As YHWH has said,
And among the remnant those whom YHWH calls.’
But in the face of all this the true people of YHWH would have nothing to fear. All who truly ‘call on the Name of YHWH’ will be saved. To ‘call on the Name of YHWH’ is to truly worship Him (see Gen 4:26; Gen 12:8; Gen 13:4; , compare 1Ki 18:24; 1Ch 16:8; Psa 105:1; Psa 116:13; Psa 116:17; Zep 3:9; Act 2:21; Rom 10:13), and this is speaking of true believers who respond to Him and intend to continually walk with Him. They will enjoy final deliverance.
But however bad things become YHWH will ensure the survival of His people. This is expressed in terms of survival in mount Zion and in Jerusalem, for they were in those days the centre of the worship of YHWH. And among them will be those whom God will call, the holy seed (Isa 6:13). The early believers and the new Israel were themselves first established in mount Zion and Jerusalem (Acts 1-12), where the pouring out of the Holy Spirit took place (Acts 2), resulting in the believing remnant of Israel, who were called by God and thus ‘called on the Lord’ (Act 2:21). Then as a result of the coming of Jesus and His resurrection mount Zion and Jerusalem were seen as transferred to Heaven (Gal 4:22-31; Heb 12:22-23; Rev 14:1; Rev 21:2; Rev 21:10).
‘As YHWH has said.’ What YHWH says will inevitably come about, for His word goes forth to accomplish it (Isa 55:10-13).
Note On Joe 2:28-31 And Act 2:16-21 .
That Peter saw a level of fulfilment of Joe 2:28 ff. in what happened at Pentecost is undeniable, simply because he himself defined it in those terms. But it is often questioned whether Peter saw Joe 2:28 as actually speaking of the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. In other words the question is, when he said, ‘this is that –’, did he mean precisely that.
Of course, regardless of what Peter did mean what is described here in Joel cannot be limited to Pentecost. At the least it also required for its fulfilment the continuing work of the Spirit that followed Pentecost. But the argument is that all that was simply a reflection of Joe 2:28 which awaits its fulfilment in the future. Now to those who insist on applying the whole of Joel to ‘the end days’ for dogmatic reasons the answer is cut and dried. Joel was talking about something that would happen to the Jews in the end days, and all that Peter was doing was say something like, ‘this is the kind of thing that Joel was talking about’.
One main argument advanced is that Peter gave the whole quotation, and it is claimed that he himself would have recognised that the so-called apocalyptic signs were not fulfilled. But that must be open to question. For Peter himself was aware that the sun had been darkened when Jesus was being crucified, and he lived in a time when blood and fire and pillars of smoke had regularly been experienced in Palestine. The Roman occupation was not always a happy one, and people like Theudas and Judas the Galilean (Act 5:36-37) were just two of those who had felt the full force of their might, resulting in blood, and fire and pillars of smoke as people died and houses were burned, something that was thrown into new light by the crucifixion of Jesus. Thus Peter might well have felt that Joel’s words had been fulfilled.
Act 2:16 ff. is also cited by Peter as connecting with ‘the last days’. This may have been because he was citing a different text from the MT, or was himself quoting loosely. But what this certainly shows is that Peter did consider that what had happened had happened in ‘the last days’. And that is not too surprising for the early Christians did see what was happening as occurring within the last days, for they saw the last days as having begun with Christ’s resurrection and exaltation as the Lord of glory. This is apparent from a number of New Testament citations. Peter himself in his letters declared that what the prophets had revealed had been for his own day (1Pe 1:12), and that Jesus ‘was made manifest at the end of the times for your sake’ (1Pe 1:20), and he claimed that ‘ the end of all things is at hand ’ (1Pe 4:7). Paul also spoke of something being ‘for our admonition, on whom the end of the ages has come’ (1Co 10:11). Whilst the writer to the Hebrews declared that God had ‘ in these last days spoken to us by the Son’ (Heb 1:2), and that Jesus Christ ‘has once for all appeared at the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself’ (Heb 9:26). It is quite clear from this that the early church saw themselves as being in ‘the last days’ and ‘at the end of the age’. They were not to know that those last days would last for over two thousand years. This being so it is difficult to believe that Peter was expecting a further outpouring of the Holy Spirit which would be unique. In our view it is clear that Peter did see Joel’s prophecy being fulfilled in his day.
This is not to deny that the Holy Spirit has continued to be manifest in special ways at certain times, and that it may well be that at some stage such a work of the Holy Spirit will take place in Jerusalem turning many Jews to their true Messiah, but it is to deny that that is required by what Joel says. What we must insist on is that Joel’s words were fulfilled in the coming of Jesus and, through Him, of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and in what followed.
End of note.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Joe 2:28. Afterward Kimchi says, that this is the same as, In the last days, Isa 2:2 and it is explained by St. Peter, Act 2:17 of the times of the Gospel. The rabbies affirm, that wherever the words occur, they denote the time of the Messiah; and therefore they refer this prophesy expressly to his days, and make it descriptive of that event which is spoken of Isa 11:9. The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord. This is unquestionably the true meaning; and though the things here prophesied of were not to happen till several ages afterwards, yet was the prophesy highly proper to encourage the minds of the pious Jews; as it was an assurance to them, that let them be brought ever so low, by this or any other calamity, yet God would preserve them a people, till all the promises made to their forefathers should be actually accomplished; and especially till the Messiah should come, under whom the knowledge of God should spread itself among all the nations of the earth, and the gifts of the Spirit of God should be poured out in a much more abundant manner than ever they were before. See Chandler.
Dr. Sharpe observes, that the prophet Joel first describes the distress of the Jews by drought and famine; and their destruction in the great day of the Lord, the day of darkness and gloominess, the like to which had never been, nor should be any more after it, to the years of many generations. Then the trumpet sounds again, and proclamation is made of the great things which the Lord will do for his people and his land. He will remove from them the northern army, and restore the years that they had lost by the great army which he had sent among them. After this, the usual transition is made to the gospel age, under the second temple. The extraordinary effusion of the Holy Spirit, which then was poured out upon all flesh, is next foretold in the clearest and strongest terms. The other great day of the Lord, the last destruction of Jerusalem, has then its place; and this part of the prophesy closes with some remarkable words, which may be considered as a short and comprehensive view of the gracious declarations in the new covenant; Joe 2:32. The word ruach, here used for Spirit, often signifies in Scripture those excellent gifts conferred by God on any particular persons; and particularly the gifts of understanding and prophesy, as well as the richest graces on the church at large. See 2Ki 2:9. Isa 2:2-3. Act 19:2; Act 19:6. The word flesh is to be understood of man only, as in Gen 6:12. Isa 66:23. &c. &c. So that this prophesy is evidently very extensive, and intended to comprehend persons of every nation, and of all sorts and ranks; as appears from the very next words, Sons and daughters, &c. expressions which denote persons of every age and condition. The gifts here promised are, 1. Prophesy: a word which is used in a very large sense in the sacred writings. See the note on Num 25:2. Dreaming of dreams: a method by which God made known his will to the patriarchs and prophets, by impressing their minds while they were asleep, with the things that he intended to communicate: sometimes directly, without any parabolical representation, which was a pure dream; as to Solomon and others: sometimes under such representations and images, as might either be a pure vision, or a vision and dream mixed; as in the case of Pharaoh, Joseph, Daniel, and others. 3. Visions: which sometimes agree with dreams, as they are a representation of divine things to persons in a deep sleep; but differ in this, that the pure dream is always a communication from God to the mind, without the impression of sensible objects on the imagination, and always in a deep sleep; whereas the vision is constantly impressed upon the imaginative faculty, and sometimes happens to the prophet while he is awake. Thus Elijah had a vision from God upon mount Horeb; and St. Peter, to reveal to him that the proselytes were to be admitted into the Christian church: St. John seems to have received all his Revelations in the same manner. In these visions or trances all the external senses seem bound up, that the mind may be wholly attentive to the divine impressions. It is added in the last place, In those days I will pour out my Spirit on the men-servants and the maidservants; to denote that rich and poor, bond and free, persons of all ranks, should be favoured with all the various gifts of that Spirit; as is plain from the beginning of the prophesy; I will pour out, &c. After which the prophet explains the effusion,by the grant of prophesy, dreams and visions, accompanied with all gospel-grace. What he says, therefore, concerning the men and maid-servants, clearly signifies, that they also shall have the Spirit in all its gifts, as plentifully as the Jews themselves. See Dr. Chandler, and the dissertation at the end of his commentary on Joel. But we must never forget, that on the day of Pentecost, when these rich gifts of the Spirit were poured out, the gospel dispensation or peculiar kingdom of Christ was opened; and greater measures of divine grace were poured forth on the church than ever were given before; and that this abundant measure of the Spirit of grace still continues to be effused on all Christian believers, and will be the grand means of ushering in and establishing the universal reign of Christ upon earth.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
SECTION II
Hereafter, on the Lay of the Lord the Enemies of Israel shall be destroyed, while the Lord reigns in Zion guarding and blessing it.
Joe 2:28-32.
[In the Hebrew text and in Schmoller, these verses form Chap. III., while Chap. III. of E. V. is numbered Chap. IV We prefer to keep the order of the E. V.F.]
The promise, which up to this point has reference to the present and the near future, now takes a higher and wider range. It brings into view the day of the Lord, the result of the coming of which shall be, on the one hand, the overthrow of the world-power, and on the other, the full blessedness of Gods people, through his dwelling in the midst of them. Joe 2:28-32 may be regarded as the introduction to the closing chapter, which describes the fulfillment of the promise. The grand events, which are the harbingers of the coming of the day of the Lord, are described. Zion is pointed out as the only place of safety; but even amid the terrors of that day, Gods people will have no reason to fear. The third chapter describes the judgments to be inflicted upon the enemies of Gods people, while the latter shall receive the richest blessings from the Lord, who sits enthroned on Zion.
28 And it shall come to pass afterward,34
That I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh,
And your sons and daughters shall prophesy;
Your old men shall dream dreams,
Your young men shall see visions;
29 Even35 upon the men servants and the maid servants,
In those days, will I pour out my spirit.
30 And I will give signs36 in heaven and on earth,
Blood, and fire, and columns of smoke;
31 The sun shall be turned into darkness,
And the moon into blood,
Before the great and terrible day of the Lord come.
32 And it shall come to pass that whosoever calleth on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance,
As Jehovah hath said;
Even among the remnant37 whom Jehovah shall call.
EXEGETICAL
Joe 2:28. And it shall come to pass, etc. What is here said of a general outpouring of the Spirit, while connected with the foregoing promise, holds out to Israel the prospect of a grander dispensation of divine grace and of richer blessings than those promised in the preceding chapter. God will manifest Himself in such a manner as He has never done before. But this outpouring of the Spirit is viewed by the prophet as connected with the great day of the Lord, and as a sign of its coming. But he thus views it only because he sees in that day, a day of judgment on Israels enemies, and a day of salvation to Israel, through Gods dwelling in Zion. If Joe 2:28-29 be considered as containing a new promise, Joe 2:30 would begin a new subject, which would be contrary to the tenor of the prophets discourse, as it is evident that these verses are closely connected.
Joe 2:28. Afterward,i. e., after what had been before announced in Joe 2:23; it is more indefinite than the last days, although, in general, the meaning is the same. Joel apparently imagines that the events which he here describes, will happen in no very distant future. , to pour, primarily refers to rain, or a heavy shower of rain; it here denotes the communicating of something from above, and in great abundance. This last idea is illustrated in the extent of the gift,to all flesh, and the nature of the gift,the spirit of prophecy in various forms. . In contrast with God, to whom the belongs, . ., man appears as flesh This term designates man not simply as a being in want of this Spirit, but also as one naturally fitted to receive it, just as the dry ground is fitted to receive the rain.All flesh. How is this general expression to be understood? It is clear from what follows that there is no limitation of sex, age, or condition, and that not merely particular individuals, but that all are to share in this divine gift,a fulfillment of the wish of Moses (Num 11:29). The connection and the train of thought require us to extend the all to mankind generally.Shall prophesy. This is explained by prophesying, dreaming dreams, seeing visions. In this enumeration the most important thing comes first, i. e., the proper prophetic function or power. means, not simply to predict future events, but generally to announce the revelations of God. The whole people will be the vehicle through which these highest spiritual utterances will be made, and as all barriers will be then broken down, woman is named by the side of man. To this prophesying are conjoined, in a sort of secondary way, other modes of divine manifestation, dreams, visions. As there is to be no difference of sex, so there is to be none of age, in regard to the sharing of this spirit. Even those who would seem to be unfitted for it shall receive itold men and children. Why, it may be asked, shall old men dream dreams? Because they are better fitted for dreams, just as young men, or children are for visions, though the reverse of this would seem to be more natural. But the condition of things predicted by the prophet would be every way extraordinary.And the servants. This is added as something very singular, and even. Nay, something unheard of shall then happen, namely, that slaves as well as freemen shall partake of this Spirit. In other words, this social distinction shall then be abolished. The Jewish interpreters could scarcely comprehend how this could be, and hence the Sept. make the servants and hand-maidens, Gods, ; so too Act 2:16.
Joe 2:30. I will show wonders. What shall be the form of these phenomena of nature? It is idle to try to answer the question. They are evidently such as had never before been seen, though they may somewhat resemble the plagues of Egypt. There will be blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. The color of blood appears in the moon; both sun and moon are obscured; and there are signs of a hiding of the face of God who rules in heaven, and consequently of his anger. These signs will be of a nature to awaken terror, and all the more, as the day approaches, for it would seem from Joe 2:28-30, that there will be hardly an interval between the sign and the day. Its menacing aspect becomes so much the more prominent inasmuch as God will then manifest Himself, not merely in a general way, but as bringing on a special crisis. The obscuration of the stars is often mentioned in connection with the day of judgment (Eze 32:7; Amo 8:9; Mat 24:29; Mar 13:24; Luk 21:25). Before the day of the Lord come. Hence these appearances are signs of the coming of this day. Its actual coming and its importance are set forth in Joel 3; here it is described only in a general way. Joe 2:32 goes on to state that for Zion it will bring neither judgment nor destruction. Here its tempest will cease. But there is, at the same time, an implied exhortation to comply with the condition of safety.
Joe 2:32. And it shall come to pass,whom the Lord shall call. To call on the name of Jehovah is to confess Him, to worship Him who has revealed, and is revealing Himself to Israel. Whosoever, with a special emphasis, to teach that the day of the Lord will not bring destruction to all, though it may have that look. There will be complete deliverance to those who call on the name of the Lord, and to none else. The reason is given, because in Mt. Zion is deliverance. As Jehovah had said. This seems to point to some positive prophetic promise. This divine promise of safety to all who call on the name of the Lord, based on the promise concerning Zion and Jerusalem, shows how closely related were these two places. They are set forth as the place where the Lord dwelt in his sanctuary with his people, and where his name is known. The calling on the Lord is wholly confined to Zion and Jerusalem, though it would be of no avail to any one to be in Zion unless he called on the Lord. Deliverance. Many take this term in a concrete and collective sense, i. e., the delivered, but the other is the more natural interpretation. The remnant, or the escaped; there shall be among them those whom the Lord calls. is one who has escaped from the field of battle, or one who has been saved from the fate of most others, and so implying that the number is small. This remnant is evidently to be added as a new class to those before mentioned as delivered by calling on the name of the Lord, the idea being that they had been overtaken by the calamity, and though delivered, their escape had been a very narrow one, and hence noticed as the result of the Lords special and merciful call. Who are they? Not those already in Zion and Jerusalem; but those who were called to come there, i. e., not to these localities merely, but to communion with the God who, calls and who is enthroned in Zion. This manifestly means that some of those who would be properly liable to the judgment, would escape it and share in the salvation promised to Zion. Who are they? Not the inhabitants of Judah living outside the walls of Jerusalem;a sense of the words entirely too limited and local. Besides, Zion and Jerusalem must be taken as including all the inhabitants of Judah wherever resident. It may, perhaps, be inferred from Joel 3 that they are the Israelites scattered among the nations, whom the Lord promises (Joe 3:16) to bring again. Yet they can scarcely be described as the remnant, or the escaped, since their deliverance is the very object of the judgment which falls upon the heathen world. Why not understand by the remnant, the heathen? They are both far off, and liable to the judgment. It would still be true that while the heathen world in general will be the object of the judgment in the day of the Lord, some of them will escape through the mercy of Jehovah. This is certainly only a faint indication of the calling of the Gentiles. This last fact is not distinctly announced, the heathen as such not having been as yet named. There is a close resemblance between Joe 2:32 and Oba 1:17, so that if the latter was the earlier prophet, we might suppose that his words had been modified by Joel. Obadiah says. there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau, in the day of the Lord. Joel also says, that this day shall be one of judgment to all outside of Zion, for all the heathen. But he does not mean that none of them shall escape, for he admits it to be possible that Jehovah might call some of them. Joel thus takes a step in advance of Obadiah, and indicates, though it may be obscurely, the work that should be done by later prophets.
[Pusey: Joe 2:28. All flesh is the name for all mankind. The words all flesh are in the Pentateuch, and in one place in Daniel, used in a yet wider sense, of everything which has life; but, in no one case, in any narrower sense. It does not include every individual in the race, but it includes the whole race, and individuals throughout it, in every nation, sex, or condition, Jew or Gentile, Greek or Barbarian, i. e., educated or uneducated, rich or poor, bond or free, male or female. On all was to be poured the Holy Spirit.
Joe 2:29. St. Peter, in declaring that these words began to be fulfilled in the day of Pentecost, quotes them with two lesser differences: I will pour out of my Spirit and upon My servants and My handmaidens. The words declare something in addition, but do not alter the meaning, and so St. Peter quotes them as they lay in the Greek, which, probably, was the language known by most of the mixed multitude to whom he spake. The words My Spirit, express the largeness and fullness of the gift. The words of my Spirit, express, in part, that He who is infinite cannot be contained by us who are finite. The words the servants, mark the outward condition. The words my servants, declare that there should be no difference between bond and free.
Joe 2:32. Call upon the name of the Lord. To call on the name of the Lord is to worship Him as He is, depending upon Him. The name of the Lord expresses his true Being, that which He is. For the name rendered, The Lord, expresses that He is and that He alone is, the self-same the unchangeable; the name rendered God is not the special name of God.F.]
[Wnsche: Joe 2:28. My Spirit. The Spirit of God is the divine analogue of the spirit of man. It is the true life principle of men; the source of physical life in the world of nature, of spiritual life in the sphere of religion, of all goodness, truth, rectitude, and beauty. Whatever the human mind thinks, feels, wills, fashions, in regard to any one of these objects is, in one sense, an outflow of the Divine Spirit. The prayer that ascends to heaven from a devout heart, the self consecration, the holy enthusiasm which distinguished the prophets, and fitted them to proclaim to the people Gods judgment and his mercy,all these are expressions and gifts of the Divine Spirit, All flesh. The word is used in Heb. to denote the totality of living being on earth, beasts and men (Gen 6:13; Gen 7:15, etc.); and then in a more limited sense, for the human race. The connection shows that, here, it is taken in the latter sense. Credner, however, gives it the wider meaning so as to include the irrational animals, and refers in confirmation of his view to the prediction of Isa 9:6-9, concerning the wolf and the lamb, the leopard and the kid, etc. But this friendly union of wild and tame animals is not represented by the prophet as the result of mens enlarged knowledge of God. Man alone is the image of God; he alone is a fit organ of the Divine Spirit; he alone has the capacity to receive the gift here described, which, therefore, cannot be extended to the lower forms of animal life.
Joe 2:32. As Jehovah hath said. There is no reference here to a lost prophecy (Meier); nor to an older writing of Joel (Ewald); nor to Obadiah (Keil). The meaning simply is that Joel, the person speaking, had a divine revelation of the fact, that where Gods throne is, there his true worshippers shall also be. Shall call. The word has a pregnant sense, conveying the idea that the deliverance depends not on the worshippers of God alone, but also upon God himself. Only those whom the Lord calls or chooses, and who call upon or choose Him shall be saved. Most of the older and later expositors take call in a predestinative sense. The Chald. has quos dominus destinat.F.]
THEOLOGICAL
1. From the very first the prophets point to a great decisive Hereafter. In their being able to do this lay their strength. Living in the present, their eyes were ever turned to the future, or rather the end, the consummation of all things. Hence the power of their exhortations and promises to their contemporaries. Their influence would have been very frail and feeble, if they had not had a firm faith in a future, when the salvation of God should be fully realized.
2. Outpouring of the Spirit of God upon all flesh. It is evident from the context that the prophet himself did not suppose that this outpouring would extend beyond the people of Israel. This was its field (Joe 2:27). Here God will reveal Himself; here in the day of the Lord the judgment will take place, here all nations shall be gathered. The whole of Joel 3 shows that the prophet considered the heathen world as the enemy of Gods people. He does not put the heathen on the same footing with Israel, but on the contrary he directs attention exclusively to the high position of Israel as Gods people. It presupposes the conversion of the heathen, and their reception among Gods people. As he nowhere predicts such a conversion, his promise of an outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh cannot here include the heathen; even if we refer the phrase whom the Lord shall call, to a selection of the heathen, it is all the more evident that the all flesh cannot include them. For the calling of individual heathen could not have the same prominence that would belong to the out-pouring of the Spirit on the whole heathen world. Joel might have assumed that some called out of the heathen world would partake of the blessing given to Israel. To Israel the promise was of something not only great but new, namely, the impartation of the Spirit to persons of all ages and conditions. Pouring out as a symbol of this impartation was never before used to denote the gift of the Spirit. Thus far only individuals in particular localities had received it. The gift was, indeed, a necessary result of the covenant relation in which Jehovah stood to Israel, but hitherto his Spirit had come only on individuals, fitting them to become divine messengers. Such a limitation, however, did not accord with the true idea of Gods people, which implies that they should all be partakers of his Spirit. This should he fully realized in the future. Every barrier shall be broken down, and the reception of this Spirit shall be limited neither by age, sex, nor condition. It would come in the form of prophetic dreams and visions, giving those who received it a deeper insight into divine things, and make them organs of divine revelation.
This promise, as given by the prophet, is twofold. On the one hand, it will thus be seen that Jehovah is in the midst of Israel. On the other hand, this general outpouring of the Spirit will be a preparatory warning of the coming of the day of the Lord. That day will be one of immediate and decisive manifestation of God, and its approach will be heralded by new and startling events fitted to excite in the minds of men eager expectation, and to rouse them to seek salvation before it was too late. These warnings may consist of extraordinary phenomena in the world of nature, or of similar phenomena in the sphere of mind. From the spirituality of the religion of Jehovah we might expect that occurrences of the latter class would predominate. Perhaps we may go farther and say that the object of these remarkable events, of this prophesying, of these dreams and visions, is the day of the Lord itself. It is clear that by this general outpouring of the Spirit the way would be prepared for such a result of the day of the Lord as must redound to the glory of Israel. Since Jehovah thus recognizes Israel as his people, by making them all individually organs of his revelation, He must, while blessing them, resist and punish their enemies. This double aspect of the day of the Lord, as one of judgment, and of redemption, is here very distinctly declared. The deliverance of individuals will not come to them as a matter of course. If they escape the terrors of that day, and share in the salvation of Gods people, it can only be by their complying with the conditions on which it is secured.
When shall this promise of a general outpouring of the Spirit be fulfilled? From the phrase after this, the prophet seems to have regarded it as connected with the promise given in the earlier part of the chapter. But it does not follow that he looked upon it as near at hand. The prophets often connect promises relating to the present, very closely with those pertaining to the far distant future. In this respect Joel and the later prophets agree. The latter represent the gift of the Spirit in its fullness to the covenant people, as a prominent feature of the Messianic age, or of the New Covenant. Jer 32:15; Jer 56:13; Eze 36:26; Zec 12:10. Hence we should, perhaps, designate this prophecy as in a general way Messianic, though Joel does not speak directly of the Messiah, and we should look for its fulfillment after the advent of Messiah. Thus St. Peter (Act 2:17) saw its accomplishment in the miracle of Pentecost. He expressly refers the , to the Messianic age. He distinctly recognizes the Messiah as the mediator through whom this rich and general bestowment of the Spirit should come. Like the prophet, he understood the all flesh, to mean, in the first instance, the covenant people, though he declares that the promise extended also to those who were afar off. Joel only intimates that the latter will escape, but does not say, in so many words, that the Spirit will be given to them. Peter evidently regardedas Joel didthis outpouring of the Spirit as a sign of the Day of the Lord, i. e., in the New Testament sense of the term, as a day of Parousia, and so quotes Joe 2:28-32. As he saw one part of the prediction accomplished, he naturally looked for the fulfillment of the other. There can be no doubt that the Apostles, at least for a time, thought that the , or the Coming of the Lord, was nigh at hand, and such prophecies as the one before us, would tend to confirm them in that expectation. On the day of Pentecost, Peter saw the Spirit poured out, not indeed on all flesh, even in the limited sense of all Israel, but he was sure that the promise of it embraced the whole covenant people, and so he opens to all the prospect of the gift, on condition of repentance.
But though the wonders of Pentecost were the first and literal fulfillment of this prophecy, they by no means exhausted its moaning. The only effect of the outpouring of the Spirit recognized by Joel, is the prophetic, and on this memorable day, it certainly appeared in an ecstatic form. But we need only to look into the Epistles of St. Paul to discover that the influence of the which Christ gives is not exhausted by such results; on the contrary, the grandest effect of it is the regeneration of the whole man. This deeper, ethico-religious conception of the gift of the Spirit, founded on the declarations of the later prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, is certainly the New Testament one. Joels idea of the close connection between the outpouring of the Spirit and the day, is in one sense a mistaken one, since the outpouring came, but not the day, yet in another view it is perfectly correct. The two are most nearly related. With Messiah have come the ; and the gift of the Spirit is, and will continue to be, a sign of the Day of the Lord, a proof that God is in the midst of his people, and will give them the victory over all their enemies.Finally, we must not overlook the limits of the field of the Spirits operations as described by Hosea. He, indeed, considered Israel alone as Gods people, and that on Israel alone would the Spirit be poured out. But as we know from the New Testament that Christs disciples are not limited to Israel, neither are Gods people, so we are sure that this outpouring of the Spirit is confined to them, i. e., to the spiritual Israel, to all who, by faith, are made one with Christ. All such partake of the Holy Ghost.
[In this somewhat prolix and verbose dissertation, the author confounds two quite distinct questions, namely, What is the real meaning of the prophecywhom does it embrace,and when and how will it be completely fulfilled? and How far did Joel comprehend the real purport of the prophetic promises, which he was inspired to utter? This last question it is impossible to answer, because Joel has left no explanation of his prediction. We have nothing but the prophecy itself. Therefore we have no means of determining whether he took the all flesh, as meaning simply Israel, or in its wider sense. After all, the question is one of no practical importance. The grand inquiry is. What is the meaning of the prophecy?F.
Wnsche: Credner is clearly wrong when he says that Peter made a false application of this prophecy. No man can deny that on the day of Pentecost, the prediction of Joel began to be accomplished. We say designedly, began to be accomplished, for although the Christian Church has been growing in divine knowledge, and has been working for the common good of all sexes, ages, and classes, more than eighteen hundred years since that day, the prophecy is not yet fulfilled. There are predictions, which have found their fulfillment in particular historical events; and there are others which embrace the entire field of humanity, and Joels belongs to this latter class. Its complete accomplishment will be the history of the kingdom of God on earth, down to the end of time.F.]
3. Let us now consider what the prophet teaches in regard to the condition of deliverance, in this terrible day of the Lord. It is not sharing in those extraordinary influences of the Spirit, whose results are involuntary, but calling on the name of the Lord, a free act, which every one who pleases can perform. There is something to be done by each individual for himself, and all are exhorted to do it. Spiritual gifts do not necessarily involve spiritual regeneration. So we find to have been the case in New Testament history, with the miraculous , which at first predominated, but gradually disappeared, giving place to a more natural and tranquil, a purer and deeper spiritual life. The condition of deliverance is stated in Joe 2:32, and all are exhorted to fulfill it. External membership with the people of Israel will not, of itself, secure salvation; but the condition is one so simple and easy, so really within the power of every one, that the verse has more the aspect of a promise than an exhortation. There is no real need that any one should be afraid of the coming of the terrible day. Its terrors may be escaped by simply calling on the Lord in Zion and Jerusalem, the place of worship. Therefore no one need ask, Where shall I find the Lord on whom I must call? for the Lord Himself has named the place of his abode.
This alone is necessary, to call on the Lord. To do this, it is not absolutely requisite that one should belong to Israel. This is plainly taught by the words just quoted. Hence Paul bases upon them the equal rights of Jews and Gentiles? But does this exposition suit the context, in which the prophet so expressly connects the deliverance with Zion and Jerusalem? If we look carefully into the matter, we shall find that it does. Zion is the place where God has revealed Himself. Without such a revelation as that made in Zion, neither calling on the Lord, nor salvation, would have been possible. Zion then (not in the local sense) is the seat and centre of salvation; because here God has manifested Himself. Paul knew that a Greek, simply as such, could not call upon the Lord, since he did not even know the Lord who had revealed Himself in Israel. Those who would call upon Him, as Paul teaches, must believe in Him, and this implies that He had been preached to them, and this was done by those who made known to the heathen the God who has manifested Himself in Zion. Paul denies that conformity to the Jewish law is a condition of salvation. All this shows the Apostles deep insight into the real meaning of Scripture. His heart beat for those afar off; he feels, and discovers instinctively, that the barriers which had separated Jew and Gentile were broken down by the very prophetic word which made salvation dependent on one thing alone, a thing within the reach equally of the Gentile and the Jew. He evidently took the words whosoever shall call, etc., in a sense large enough to embrace the whole Gentile world. On exegetical grounds, as we have seen, we are authorized though not compelled to give them this breadth of meaning. In the last clause of Joe 2:32 the phrase occurs, whom the Lord shall call, and it conveys the idea that salvation is not a matter of right, but of grace alone. With regard to all who are afar off this divine call is the cause of deliverance. If they had not been thus called they must certainly have perished, so that they owe their escape solely to the gracious call of God. But it is at the same time clearly implied that this call becomes effective and saving only when the man himself turns to the Lord.
HOMILETICAL
Joe 2:28. Afterward. A prophetic word of profound meaning. When? The prophets themselves did not know. Yet these promises were, for the present, a light shining in a dark place. But what kings and prophets of old desired to see and saw not, we see, who live in the times of fulfillment. To us the Afterward has become Now. To many, it is only a Once, a Formerly. They forget that the fulfillment of these prophetic words never grows old, but has a perpetual Now, which it becomes us to comprehend and improve until the Lord comes. For as that Afterward has become a Now, in Him in whom all the promises are yea and amen, so He still points us to a more distant Afterward, when there will be nothing new in distinction from the old, except as sight is distinguished from faith, and the end from the beginning.
I will pour out my Spirit. True fellowship with God implies the participation of the Spirit of God. So long as this privilege is confined to individual communion with God, on the part of men, it must be simply an object of desire and hope, notwithstanding the means used to extend it. Blessed privilege of the New Covenant, that in Christ every one may receive the Spirit of God. All special privileges are done away; all separating walls are broken down. The lowest as well as the loftiest can now aspire to be taught by the Spirit of God, and so to become a co-worker with God. How wonderful the condescension and the grace of God! (See Gal 3:28.) How plain is it that the religion of the Old Testament, though itself far from attaining this end, foreshadowed it, and revealed the way to it.
[Henry: God hath reserved some better things for us, the kingdom of grace, and the kingdom of glory, and the happiness of true believers in both. We often read in the Old Testament of the Spirit of the Lord coming like drops, as it were, upon the judges and prophets whom God raised up for extraordinary services, but now, the Spirit shall be poured out plentifully, in a full stream.
Pusey: God alone can be poured out into the soul, so as to possess it, enlighten it, teach, kindle, bend, move it as He wills, sanctify, satiate, fill it. The prophetic word circles round to that wherewith it began, the all-containing promise of the large outpouring of the Spirit of God; and that, upon those whom the carnal Jews at all times would least expect to receive it. It began with including the heathen; it instances individual gifts, and then it ends by resting on the slaves. The order of the words is significant. He begins I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and then in order to leave the mind resting on these same great words, He inverts the order and ends, and upon the servants, etc. It leaves the thoughts resting on the great words I will pour out my Spirit.
Robinson: A Christian even now, animated and influenced by the Holy Ghost is a wonderful being, as superior to the rest of mankind, as man is superior to the beasts of the field. But what will he be then? There have been mighty men amongst us, a Milton, a Boyle, a Newton in a former age, and some in the present, who, with the highest gifts of genius, have been endowed with eminent gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit; but who shall say in that future dispensation, to what heights of wisdom and knowledge and power man may be advanced? Every discovery in science, every progressive improvement, such as the present age has developed, are prophecies and earnests of that glorious time here promised.F.]
Joe 2:30. Show wonders. The New Covenant has brought salvation, but it also brings sifting judgments corresponding to the greatness of this salvation. The question now is, how men will deal with it; and most certain is it that God will remove everything opposed to Him and his kingdom. Hence, with the salvation in Christ, there was need of this last separating judgment. Great displays of Gods grace and great judgments often go together, the latter preparing the way for the former. So was it in Jerusalem. Those who despised the kindly tongues of flame on the day of Pentecost, had blood, fire, and vapor of smoke as the symbols of destruction. So is it now. Those who quench the Spirit, despise prophesyings, and give themselves up to the flesh and the world will find that day all the more terrible, and that their damnation slumbereth not. The best thing is to be always ready for that day of God. If we delay until it actually comes, it may be too late.
[Henry: The judgments of God upon a sinful world, and the frequent destruction of wicked kingdoms by fire and sword, are prefaces to and presages of the judgment of the world in the last day.
Pusey: Each revelation of God prepares the way for another, until that last revelation of his love and of his wrath in the great day.F.]
Joe 2:32. Whosoever calleth. Happy they who are found watching and praying when the Lord comes. We may escape the judgment, therefore we should not despair. All that is necessary is believing prayer to God. For every one who confesses God, He will confess. But such escape we must earnestly seek for ourselves. The coming of Christ has two aspects; to the godless, it will be a day of condemnation and wrath: to believers, a day of redemption and refreshing. In Zion and Jerusalem., i. e., in the God who is there revealed, is redemption. He who believes in Christ is in Zion, for he confesses Him as the God of Zion. To Him belongs the glory of our salvation. Examine thyself to see thy real condition. The ability to stand in the judgment will come, not from any outward excellence, nor even from gracious privileges or preminence. The remnant. God desires not to destroy, but to save. Hence his constant and gracious call to all who are afar off, to come and be saved. Even the heathen, who belong not to his chosen people, can obtain salvation. Not indeed unless He calls them; but if He does call and they yield to it through his grace, they share in the gifts of his people. Art thou among the called ones of God? Hast thou heard his call? Thou mayest be called and yet perish at last. Many are called, few chosen. God calls all, but He, in turn, will be called upon in faith.
[Henry: This is ground of comfort and hope to sinners, that whatever danger there is in their case, there is also deliverance for them, if it be not their own fault. And if we would share in this deliverance we must apply ourselves to the Gospel Zion, to Gods Jerusalem. It is the praying remnant that shall be the saved remnant. And it will aggravate the ruin of those who perish, that they might have been saved on such easy terms. Those only shall be delivered in the great day that are now effectually called from sin to God, from self to Christ, from things below to things above.
Scott: The Gospel calls men in general to partake of its blessings, and of that salvation which is revealed and placed in the Church; and whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord Jesus, as the Son of God and the Saviour of sinners, shall be delivered from the wrath to come. This is the happy case of that remnant of every age and people whom the Lord calls by his regenerating Spirit; all things shall work together for their good; they may look forward with comfort for the day, when nature shall expire in convulsions, assured that then their eternal redemption shall be perfected.F.]
Footnotes:
[34]Joe 2:28.Afterward. is clearly identical with the formula used by the later prophets. , the last days.
[35]Joe 2:29.Even. The also of E. V. hardly expresses the emphasis of .
[36]Joe 2:30Signs. denotes not signs, but rather prodigies, miraculous signs of coming events.
[37]Joe 2:32. Remnant. properly means deliverance, escape. Here the abst. is used for the cone. Schmoller and Wnsche render the escaped.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
DISCOURSE: 1182
SIGNS OF THE MESSIAHS ADVENT
Joe 2:28-32. And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions: and also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days, will I pour out my Spirit. And I will shew wonders in the heavens, and in the earth, blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the Lord come. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered.
IT is much to be regretted that the obscurities which occur in the prophetic writings (especially those of the lesser prophets) deter many from reading so large a portion of the inspired volume. If there are some parts hard to be understood, there are some parts plain and highly instructive: and the very figures, which from their boldness and sublimity appear intricate, will be found easy and intelligible, through the light reflected on them in the New Testament. The passage before us would, on a cursory perusal, be deemed incapable of any sober construction, or, at least, of any proper application to ourselves: but it plainly declares to us,
I.
The signs of the Messiahs advent
Numberless were the signs by which the world were taught to know the true Messiah: we here notice only two:
1.
The effusion of his Spirit for the conversion of his elect
[The Spirit in preceding ages had been given to those of the Jewish nation only, and to but few even of those, and in a scanty measure; but was afterward, that is, in the times of the Messiah, to be poured out abundantly, on Gentiles as well as Jews, and without any distinction of age, sex, or quality, the meanest as well as the greatest being chosen to participate this benefit. This was literally fulfilled, as St.Peter affirms, on the day of Pentecost [Note: Act 2:16-21.]. We must not however limit the operations of the Spirit to the imparting of miraculous gifts: the terms used by the prophet import, that they who should receive the Spirit should be so instructed in the mind and will of God, as to be led to call on the Messiah, and enjoy the deliverance which he was coming to effect. Nor must the prophecy be confined to the apostolic age: for St. Peter also testifies that the promise is to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call [Note: Act 2:39.].]
2.
The execution of judgments for the punishment of his enemies
[As an Apostle has explained the former part of the text, so has our Lord himself that which now presents itself to our view [Note: Mat 24:7; Mat 24:29 and Luk 21:11; Luk 21:25.]. The immediate subject, to which these figurative expressions refer, is the destruction of Jerusalem: nor, whether we consider the prodigies that accompanied the siege [Note: See Doddridges note on Act 2:19.], or the devastation and bloodshed occasioned by the Roman armies, are they too strong to represent the scenes which occurred in that devoted city. But those calamities were only shadows of infinitely heavier judgments that shall fall on the ungodly in the last day [Note: Our Lord so blends the two events together in Matthew 24. that it is not always easy to determine to which of the two his expressions are to be referred.]. Then, while the heavens pass away with a great noise, and the elements melt with fervent heat, and the earth and the works also that are therein are burnt up, will all the contemners of the Messiah wail because of his wrath and fiery indignation [Note: 2Pe 3:10. with Rev 1:7.]. It is indeed in the former sense only that this can be a sign to convince the world at present; but in the latter sense it will hereafter be a demonstration to the whole universe, that all which had been spoken of Christ was true.]
To encourage an earnest expectation of the Messiah, the prophet declares,
II.
The blessedness of those that believe on him
The subjects of the Messiahs kingdom are characterized as calling upon his name
[To call upon Christ is, to give him all that honour and worship that are due to the Supreme Being. This was done by the first martyr, Stephen, and by all the Christian Church [Note: Act 7:59 and 1Co 1:2.]. It was that which rendered them so odious to the Jews [Note: Act 9:14; Act 9:21.], and so distinguished among the Gentiles [Note: Pliny, in his letter to the Emperor Trajan, stating for his information the conduct of Christians, says, they met on certain days before it was light to sing a hymn to Christ as God.]. And, at this hour, it justly describes all those who are endued with the Spirit. All, without exception, regard Christ as the only source of life and salvation, and depend on him for daily supplies of grace and strength: the life which they now live in the flesh, is altogether by faith in the Son of God.]
Nor shall any of that description ever experience the calamities that were foretold as coming on the ungodly world
[The deliverance mentioned in the prophecy before us, doubtless referred primarily to the escape of the Christians from Jerusalem, while the Jews, hemmed in on every side, were reduced to the greatest miseries. But we must extend our views to a more important deliverance, even from sin and Satan, death and hell: it is from these that the sincere follower of Christ will be saved, while all who reject him will perish under the displeasure of an incensed God. In this view St. Paul quotes the very words before us, expressly applying them to Christ as the object of our worship, and confining the blessings of salvation to those who call upon him [Note: Rom 10:12-13.]. At the same time we must observe that none who comply with this direction are excluded; Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, whatever he may have been, or whatever he may have done in times past, provided he call in sincerity and truth, shall find the Lord rich in mercy towards him.]
This subject will be found of use,
1.
To confirm our faith against the cavils of infidels
[There have been in every age some, who have rejected Christianity as a cunningly devised fable. But we would ask, Was the effusion of the Spirit predicted? or could the accomplishment of that prediction be counterfeited? Was the destruction of Jerusalem foretold? Did Jesus apply the very words of our text to that event, and declare that they should be accomplished before that generation should pass away? And did this also happen within the time specified, attended with such prodigies as strictly corresponded with the terms of this prophecy? Then Christianity must be of divine original; Jesus must be the true Messiah; and salvation must be, as he has declared, through faith in him. Let us then never be moved away from the hope of the Gospel, but hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering.]
2.
To vindicate our experience against the calumnies of scoffers
[St. Peter adduces this passage in vindication of those who had received the miraculous influences of the Spirit; and asserts that, what was profanely imputed to intoxication, was indeed a fulfilment of the words of Joel. Thus scoffers of the present day deride all pretensions to the enlightening and sanctifying influences of the Spirit, and, without any candid examination, impute them to folly or hypocrisy. Our professions of faith in Christ, our simple dependence on him, and assured hope of salvation by him, are also deemed enthusiasm. But if we can say, This is that which was spoken by the Prophet Joel, or by Peter, or by any other inspired writer, we need not regard their calumnies. If it was said to the apostles, Ye are drunk, we may be content to have it said of us, Ye are fools. Let us then seek more and more earnestly the operations of the Spirit, and be daily calling on the Lord Jesus for grace and mercy: so shall our experience accord with the sacred oracles, and our deliverance be completed, when the sufferings of infidels and scoffers shall commence.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
But here we have the sum and substance of the whole in one of the richest promises ever made, as the effect of salvation, and most comprehensive of all blessings. It is impossible to err in the explanation of this passage, or to make a mistake in the application of it. Indeed God the Holy Ghost would not leave it to any human comment, and therefore commissioned Peter the Apostle to take it up, and make it for the subject of his sermon on the day of Pentecost, directly referring to what Joel hath here said, to that glorious event. I beg the Reader therefore to turn to that scripture, and read the whole from beginning to end. Act 2 throughout. It were to hold up a small lighted taper to the sun, to offer any illustration beyond what these two scriptures so fully explain; this part of Joel’s prophecy, with the accomplishment of it, as related in that Chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. I only beg the Reader to remark with me, what an answer those blessed scriptures then gave to the infidels mockery, of the first descent of the Holy Ghost; and what an everlasting answer the same precious portions of God’s Holy Word are unceasingly giving now to modern sceptics, who impiously presume to confine the out-pouring of the Spirit to those early ages of the Church, and to the Apostles of Christ only: as if the work of God the Holy Ghost had ceased, when the Church of Christ was once established: as if his blessed agency was no longer necessary, and his glorious act of regeneration was no longer to be known. Blessed Spirit of all truth! how plain, how evident it is, that agreeably to our Lord’s own sure promise, thy presence and thy power was to be known and felt by thy people forever. Joh 14:16-17 . Reader! look over the several interesting particulars in this sweet promise of a covenant God in Christ, and bless God, if so be you find your own personal character marked among the number. Observe . the extensiveness of the blessing, it is upon all flesh; that is, no longer confined to the Jews, but also extending to the Gentile. It is not only upon the priests, but the people also. Not only upon sons, but upon daughters; not only young men and maidens, but old men and children. Not only Masters, but servants: for in the Gospel Church there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither bond nor free, neither male nor female, for they are all one in Christ Jesus. Gal 3:28 . And, Reader, go on to remark in the other part of this most blessed prophecy how fully and completely it hath been confirmed, and is every day confirming in the earth. The out-pouring of the Spirit produceth, as was promised, such wonderful changes in the whole system of men’s minds and manners, as carry with them the highest demonstrations that Christ’s kingdom of grace reigneth in the hearts of his people. God the Father promised that when he poured his spirit upon the seed of Christ, and his blessing upon his offspring, they should shew the blessed effects of those gifts in their lives and conversation. And here the whole is proved. They call upon the Lord, and the Lord acknowledgeth the call. I will say it is my people, saith the Lord, and they shall say the Lord is my God. See those scriptures, Zec 13:9 ; Gal 5:22-25 ; Rom 8:9-16 . And while those and the like scriptures, fully prove the gracious effects resulting from the out-pouring of the spirit, in the latter-day dispensation, under the gospel; there is joined with this promise the solemn threatening of God, which will distinguish those characters on whom the regenerating power of the spirit is not found. This is set forth under the strong images of the sun darkened, and the moon turned into blood; intimating the horrible condition of those who count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing, and do despite to the spirit of grace. Well may everyone that reads this solemn scripture cry out, from hardness of heart, and contempt of thy word and commandment, good Lord deliver us! Heb 10:26-29 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Promised Blessings
Joe 2:28-32
This is a stage in the development of human history. The Lord never recedes; he continually and necessarily advances. His creation is succeeded by redemption; redemption is followed by sanctification; sanctification is completed by heaven and all that heaven means. There the imagination can fly no further; it must rest, and with closed eyes recall the wonders that have passed. A marvellous connection of words is this “my spirit” and “all flesh.” The time will come when there will be no flesh; the body is but for a moment, it is a temporary hut on the road; it may be made for the time being the very house of God and temple of the Spirit, but the condemnation of death is upon it. Nor need the body be all flesh; it may symbolise a spiritual body, a mystical temple, and it may be so disciplined and overruled and chastened as to be the soul’s companion and helpmeet. This is the conquest of Gethsemane, this is the victory of the Cross; it is a struggle that tries every energy, and destroys what it tries, unless every energy be inspired, nourished, and daily sustained by the Holy Ghost. A wonderful word, too, is this “all flesh”; whatever is expansive, inclusive, firmamental in its reach and majesty of sympathy and security is divine, and is characteristic of the divine rule. We are all the work of God’s hands, and the work of his own hands he will never forsake. The Lord made us, and not we ourselves; so whether Jews or Gentiles, whether near at hand or far away, we are all under God’s eye, we are all shaped by God’s hand, we are all illumined by God’s Holy Spirit. The time has been promised when the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. Thus the Lord breaks down supposed partiality, and invidious preferences, and small and worthless elections, and goes forth in the majesty of his love to claim the universe. There is no waste land in God’s creation; if any beasts have claimed it, or any fiends have sought to possess it, they will be destroyed, yea, they shall be driven away with double destruction, and all God’s universe shall be beautiful as a flower, bright as a star. This is all to come. Yet, meanwhile, God has been doing everything that is indicative of the advance and consummation of this beneficent purpose.
This is not a separating spirit; old men and young men, and sons and daughters are all to be involved in this great baptism of divinest love. The official spirit separates itself from common life. The official man is daily tempted to commit the sin of contempt against the commonalty. It is difficult for the pulpit to be also the pew; yet the pew is as inspired as the pulpit. We speak of an inspired ministry; we should also speak of an inspired Church. The ministry is for the Church, not the Church for the ministry; we should look to the household of faith as the great elective and ordaining power. He who is not ordained by the priesthood of believers is not ordained at all, though a thousand prelates may have put their jewelled fingers on his barren head. Whatever tends to separate the teacher from the taught in any sense that breeds contempt is evil. The teacher is only a fellow student, an elder brother. Apollos, eloquent and mighty in the Scriptures, must go to Priscilla and Aquila, and sit with them, and in their humble home talk over mysteries with which he, with all his eloquence and might, is but a novice. The inspiration of the Church is a grander conception than the inspiration of any class belonging to the Church. We prove our inspiration by the uses to which we put our gift by our charity, our nobleness, our sweetness of soul, our moral wholesomeness. It is useless to lay down parchments and papers bearing quaint old seals to prove our inspiration; we are not certificated, we are inspired, if we are truly in the kingdom of God. No man ever preaches to a congregation in which there are not men who know much more than he does. They may not know it along some particular line of which he is master, but they know by the heart, by experience, by a thousand instances that have passed before their critical eyes; they know the right from the wrong, the true from the false; they cannot be imposed upon by spiritual dross, they are well acquainted with the gold and the fine gold of the sanctuary.
This inspiration, observe, goes from old to young: “Old men shall dream dreams.” Then they are not old men. There are no old dreamers the dream keeps the soul young; it has always a new colouring upon it, always a new tone ringing through it, always does it open a new outlook in the cloudy horizon. “Their young men shall see visions.” That well becomes them. Passion does not dream; it sees heavens, figures, it has a gift and faculty for the turning of clouds into letters, and storms into speeches, and all nature into a library and a sanctuary of learning. Woe to the Church when the young men shall see no visions, when they are ox-eyed, when they look down into the pasture that they may take another mouthful of succulent grass! Honour to the nation, and great advance, when the young men see some brighter things, when they call out, Excelsior! higher, Meliora! better things yonder. Where the young men talk so you cannot keep a community permanently back. Dreams and visions are the real power of life. They are not so accounted, but because they are not so accounted they are not therefore divested of their spiritual significance and their spiritual power. It is the dream that rules; it is the vision white, ghostly, spectral outline, partly a thought, partly a thing, a shape without a shape that leads the sentiment and the ambition of the world. It is one of two things: it is inspiration coming down from above, or indigestion and evil suggestion coming up from within, from corrupt selfish desire, narrow and crude ambition. The Bible promises great things, brighter things, always grander things than we have yet seen. When we have heard the prophecy, we have said, This is the consummation of prophecy, there can be nothing beyond this; write Finis at this point, for this is the end. And lo, while our ignorance is thus drawing lines, behold, a new heaven opens, and a morning unprecedented in brightness dawns upon the world.
Everything is going on but the Church. The Church never does go on when it can stand still. The Church is cursed with the spirit of finality. By “the Church” understand not one section or denomination, but all sections, all communions, constituting in their entirety the so-called Ecclesia, the body religious, and the body spiritual, convened for the representation of God, and the affirmation of the laws of his kingdom. The Church is a coward; the Church dare not speak above its breath; the Church will be glad if you will allow it to sleep under the stars anywhere, anyhow. The power that should be inspired, and that should lead all politics, all learning, all science, all civilisation, will be very thankful if you will shake your tablecloth, and let it catch what crumbs it can We must never forget that God has been present in all ages; that inspiration is a growing quantity, but it has always been the gift of God to the race he made. Inspiration is not confined to this class or to that class; wherever there is a man, you find in that man something that indicates that he is immeasurably superior to the finest, strongest, noblest beast that treads the jungle; ay, infinitely more than the brightest winged bird, that seems to have some native right to go up to the sun, and ask him to speak in syllables of light. God has never left himself without witness. It may be questioned whether in many boasted departments of progress we are so far forward as were many ancient men. There was one Cimon, an Athenian, who lived in anything but a healthful national or civic atmosphere; but Cimon, the Athenian, gave orders to throw down all his fences and hedges, that the poor and the stranger might come into his garden and eat what fruit they wanted. Christians, particularly Quaker Christians, build very high walls, and make very fine speeches about other people’s fruit. Seneca never heard of Christ, never was in the Church, as we understand that term, but he wrote with his pagan hand, “Wherever we are, God is; and wherever we are, the divine and the human are equally distant.” Was that not an inspired thought? Said he, in geometric phrase, “Every point in the circumference is equally distant from the centre.” Thus the Lord hath not left himself without witness in the world. Pericles never made a public speech without first making a private prayer to the gods; and his were poor gods, miserable dumb gods, that had no answer either to profanation or to reverence; yet such prayer did Pericles good. Every prayer does a man good. If a man should even in his ignorance pray to stock or stone, he will rise from his altar a stronger clearer-minded man, better able to speak in public, to fight battles, and to conduct the business of the nation. Prayer, though it be poured downward, if with an honest heart lifts the mind to a higher level. He who never prays never realises his fullest, broadest, noblest self. He who truly prays keeps the age under his feet; he goes out to fight and to win, and returns asking help, that he may bear his trophies safely home.
So the Lord hath had great compassion upon the race. We boast of our immediate civilisation. Until very recently, comparatively speaking, men could be taken up bodily, and put in gaol for debt in a Christian land, under a Christian sun, and under a Christian sovereign, and under all manner of Christian paraphernalia and pretension. The old Greek Solon abolished imprisonment for debt, and he never heard even of Congregationalism; so ignorant was he, and benighted, that he never heard of any of our modern denominations. Yet he was it by a spirit infernal or by a spirit divine? abolished bodily imprisonment for men who were unable to pay their debts. We have our institutions for the prevention of cruelty to animals; we think they are very modern, we praise ourselves for having invented a new authority. Pythagoras suggested the doctrine of the transmigration of souls in order that he might, in his day, and in his pagan darkness, prevent cruelty to animals; for, the pagan would say, we cannot tell what spirit is in this animal; in smiting this beast of burden we may be smiting some one whom we ought to honour and love. Sometimes the invention of a superstition may be turned into practical philanthropy. What do we more than others? How far have we carried this larger and diviner inspiration? Let us think of these things, and be at once humbled and instructed.
So the Lord will pour out his spirit upon the old man and the young man, and the sons and the daughters. Will he end there? Is this an invidious inspiration? Is this for the household circle only that eats at the same table, and gratifies its appetite under the same barren benediction? Nay, verily “And also upon the servants and upon the handmaids in those days will I pour out my Spirit.” We do not get the right meaning by thinking of servants in the modern sense of the term. The real word here is slaves. The Lord says, I will inspire slaves; I will not forget men whose clanking chains are heard in the field and in the prison-house. Slaves are men. This is the Bible, this is the book that is sometimes ruthlessly spoken against; this is the revelation of God. And that revelation was made to others; it was made to the same Seneca whose words we have just quoted. Writing to Lucilius his friend, he said, “I am glad that you are living on terms of familiarity with your slaves slaves? nay, men. Slaves? companions rather. Slaves? no, humble friends. Slaves? fellow slaves.” These were the words of the old moralist; how much higher have we risen? We might have risen infinitely higher if we had accepted our day of visitation, and availed ourselves of the profounder and grander inspiration; but we are willing to pick up the crumbs, we are willing to sit anywhere. The Church knows nothing of politics; the Church ought not to meddle with business; the Church must be shut up in solitary confinement to sing its little hymns and prattle its little beliefs, and go out and forget them, to mingle with strenuous, tumultuous, perilous life. Whereas if this word of inspiration be true, and if this promise be ours, and if we are living under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, the Church should be the uppermost power in society; it should lead all fashion, all sentiment, all art; I repeat, all civilisation. The Church should be so large as to make heresy impossible or absurd. The Church should not be geometrical, drawing its little circle, or its sharp-angled parallelogram, and saying, Within these lines you must live and move and have your being, and you can hang up on the walls of these lines whatever little idolatrous beliefs you care to have there, in chromo or in fresco, or in water-colours or oils; but you must not go beyond these lines. We who might have our picture on the heavens, we to whom the firmament is granted as a gallery, we, the living Church, dare not mention anything political; dare not refer to business; dare not rectify the yard-measure that is short, or the scales that are unequal; we can only nurse the doll orthodoxy, and take it out on Sundays in some ecclesiastical perambulator the Church that is promised inspiration, that the Holy Ghost longs to come into, to fill, to warm with fire, and to bless with light!
We read in one verse here of “the name of the Lord.” We cannot understand what that means by looking at it in this plain English. “The name of the Lord” was a very significant word in the olden times. Elijah said, “Call on your gods, and I will call on the name of the Lord.” The real meaning is, The Lord is; I will call on the I AM, the Eternal Life, that throbs in all the universe, that breathes in the wind, that blooms in the flower, that burns in the star, that exalts itself in the immeasurable firmament, that thunders with the voice of many waters, around whom the lightnings gather themselves and say, Here we are. I will call upon the Essence. Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord in that sense, the I AM, the Triune, the Three-One, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, shall be delivered, shall be saved. We can never reconcile these things theologically, and get all men to accept them in terms and forms of expression; but the soul is larger than any body into which you can put it; the spirit cannot be confined within any cage of man’s creation. There are times when we need God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost. We may not be conscious of that need every day; for some time, a long time it may be, we may lack the religious consciousness altogether, and nature is enough for us, and our bodily desires and temporal ambitions satisfy all we need; at other times we rise in the fulness of our immortality, and claim all heaven as a resting-place and as a sphere of service. At those larger times we need the Cross, the blood, the propitiation, the atonement, the mystery of the priesthood of Christ. Let us understand that only because Christ came has the Holy Ghost come; the Holy Spirit is the gift of Christ; he shall not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear and see that shall he relate to the Church; he will show you things to come. If the Church received this gift of Christ, it would be prescient; it would read the future like an open volume, and its heart would be at rest.
Prayer
Almighty God, teach us that thou art watching us in all our ways; may we accept this fact joyfully, knowing that if our ways please the Lord thou wilt make our enemies to be at peace with us. They that obey thee shall enjoy thy peace. May we through obedience become good scholars in thy school. Thou hast told us that if we do thy will we shall know thy doctrine; help us to obey, that we may learn, and thus to do and suffer that we may know all highest truth, all divinest teaching. We have begun at the wrong point; we have thought first to know, whereas we should have sought to obey, to do what little we can, to follow what light is already shining, and they that follow on to know the Lord shall ultimately enjoy his presence and his heaven. Thou didst send thy Son to die for us, and rise again, and now we hail him as our Intercessor, our Daysman between God and us, who knows us, who bare our sin, who carried our sorrow, and who understands our whole position. We put ourselves in the hands of Christ; for us they were nailed to the shameful tree. We will know thee through thy Son, and through thy Son we will offer our poor adoration to thee. We know that thou art a Rewarder of them that diligently seek thee; we feel thy presence in all things; we are assured that the earth belongeth unto the Lord, and that the history of man is a revelation of the purposes of heaven. Enable us to believe this, that we may have rest and security and great joy, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea. Be the refuge of our soul; be thou in Christ Jesus the Lord, the sanctuary of our spirit, into which we may run in the day of calamity, and in which we may hold sweet communion with thee when all outside is full of trouble. Thou knowest the way that we take, and when thou hast tried us thou wilt bring us forth as gold. Teach us that we are at school; show us that thy purpose through and through is one of love and care. Thou art nurturing us, and bringing us onward from stage to stage in an upward progress, thy meaning being that we shall find our way into the place prepared for us by the Son of God. We are frail, and weak, and weary; our hearts often ache, and our eyes are often blinded with tears, and our whole way seems wrapped in a dark cloud: in these experiences may we be able to say, Clouds and darkness are round about him, but righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne; though he slay me, yet will I trust in him; if for a small moment he has forsaken me, with everlasting mercies he will gather me. Thus in great distresses may we realise thy great promises; in our hunger remind us that in our Father’s house there is bread enough and to spare. Help us to read thy Word amongst men; enable us to see that the Cross is the central point of all history; the explanation of eternity on its human side; and to the Cross may we fly as men who are dying of thirst hasten to brooks, and streams, and fountains, and there may we find all that our soul needs, because we find cleansing from sin, pardon of iniquity, release from the remorseful past, and an assurance that all our discipline rightly accepted and sanctified shall end in the perfectness of our character. The Lord hear us at all times; the Lord sometimes answer us. Separate the chaff from the wheat, the folly from the wisdom; and thou wilt only answer those prayers that cry to thee for more light, more holiness, more likeness to thy Son. Amen.
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
Joe 2:28 And it shall come to pass afterward, [that] I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:
Ver. 28. And it shall come to pass afterwards ] sc. In the days of the Messiah, which is called the “world to come,” Heb 2:5 , but especially after his ascension, see Joh 7:37 Act 2:17-21 , where this prophecy was fulfilled, and this place taken for the first text preached on by the apostles, Joe 2:17 , to the conversion of three thousand souls at one sermon. For together with the word there went forth a power, even that “spirit of power, of love, and of a sound mind,” Luk 7:21 2Ti 1:7 , here promised to be poured out, not distilled only, See Trapp on “ Zec 12:10 “ and that upon all flesh. Spirit upon flesh, the best thing upon the basest; yea, upon all flesh, without respect of persons or difference made of sex, age, or condition, provided that they know and acknowledge themselves to be but flesh, Gen 6:3 , corrupt and carnal ( animas etiam incarnavimus, as St Bernard complaineth), and that whatsoever is of “the flesh is flesh,” Joh 3:6 (for who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?) that whole man is in evil, and whole evil in man; neither can it be gotten out in any measure, till the heart be mollified and made tender as flesh, Eze 11:19 ; Eze 36:26-27 , which cannot be done till men be taught of God, and drawn out of darkness into his marvellous light; till they be spiritualized and “transformed into the same image from glory to glory as by the spirit of the Lord,” 2Co 3:18 .
And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy
Your old men shall dream, &c., your young men shall see visions
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Joe 2:28-32
28It will come about after this
That I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind;
And your sons and daughters will prophesy,
Your old men will dream dreams,
Your young men will see visions.
29Even on the male and female servants
I will pour out My Spirit in those days.
30I will display wonders in the sky and on the earth,
Blood, fire and columns of smoke.
31The sun will be turned into darkness
And the moon into blood
Before the great and awesome day of the LORD comes.
32And it will come about that whoever calls on the name of the LORD
Will be delivered;
For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem
There will be those who escape,
As the LORD has said,
Even among the survivors whom the LORD calls.
Joe 2:28-32 The Masoretic Text begins chapter 3 at this point, but the English Bible, following the Septuagint and the Vulgate, continues chapter 2.
This stanza becomes the OT referent for Peter’s Pentecostal sermon (the first gospel sermon of the church) recorded in Acts 2. Several powerful eschatological truths are noted:
1. YHWH pouring out His Spirit on all flesh (Joe 2:28-29, cf. Isa 44:3-4; Eze 39:29)
2. apocalyptic signs in the heavens (positive, Joe 2:3-31; negative, Amo 5:18; Amo 5:20)
3. salvation/deliverance through calling on YHWH’s name (cf. Psa 50:15; Isa 55:6-7; Jer 29:12; Jer 33:3; Act 2:21; Rom 10:8-13)
4. the presence of a believing remnant
Notice that Peter does not mention any promises to national Israel! Israel is not the focus of the NT or the new age. The New Covenant (cf. Jer 31:31-34; Eze 36:22-38) has a different focus. At this point I am going to insert the introductory material from my commentary on Revelation, which deals with these OT issues.
SPECIAL TOPIC: Why OT Covenant Promises seem Different from NT Covenant Promises
Joe 2:28 And it will come about after this The question is, what is the time frame?:
1. post-exilic restoration
2. interbiblical (Maccabean)
3. eschatological
Peter’s use of this material in Acts 2 shows that for NT believers #3 is the proper period in which to interpret this wonderful prophecy.
I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind The coming of the Spirit (sent by YHWH) is the sign of the New Age, the New Covenant, the Messianic period (cf. Isa 32:15; Isa 44:3; Jer 31:31-34; Eze 36:22-38; Eze 39:29).
It is surely true that the full personality and deity of the Holy Spirit is not revealed in the OT, but through progressive revelation He is in the NT (see Special Topic: THE TRINITY below). Probably this is because of the culturally surprising and theologically unique monotheism of the OT. This is demonstrated by all causality being attributed to YHWH (cf. Deu 32:39; Job 5:18; Isa 45:7; Hos 6:11; Amo 3:6).
What a tremendous universal element (cf. Isa 40:5; Isa 42:6; Isa 45:22; Isa 49:6; Isa 51:4; Isa 52:10; Luk 2:32). This same theme is repeated in Joe 2:32, that whoever calls on the LORD.
The Spirit in the OT is depicted in several ways:
1. Elohim’s active force in creation, Gen 1:2; Job 33:4; Psa 104:29-30; Psa 147:14-18
2. YHWH’s personal influence, Gen 6:3; Isa 63:10
3. God’s empowering influence
a. artistic, Exo 28:3; Exo 31:3; Exo 35:31
b. leadership
(1) Moses, Num 11:17; Isa 63:11
(2) 70 elders, Num 11:25
(3) Joshua, Num 27:18; Deu 34:9
(4) Saul, 1Sa 10:6; 1Sa 10:10; 1Sa 11:6
(5) David, 1Sa 16:13-14; 2Sa 23:2
c. military deliverers, Jdg 3:10; Jdg 6:34; Jdg 11:29; Jdg 13:25; Jdg 14:6; Jdg 14:19; Jdg 15:14; Jdg 15:19
d. prophecy, Num 24:2; 1Sa 19:20; 1Sa 19:23; 1Ki 18:12; 1Ki 22:24; 2Ki 2:16; 2Ch 15:1; 2Ch 18:23; 2Ch 20:14; 2Ch 24:20; Psa 143:11; Isa 48:16; Eze 11:5; Eze 11:24; Mic 3:8
4. uniquely in the Messiah, Isa 11:2; Isa 42:4; Isa 59:21; Isa 61:1
It is not until the NT that the personality and deity of the Spirit is developed.
SPECIAL TOPIC: SPIRIT IN THE BIBLE
SPECIAL TOPIC: PERSONHOOD OF THE SPIRIT
SPECIAL TOPIC: THE TRINITY
Joe 2:28-29 your sons and daughters. . .old men. . .young men. . .male and female servants Notice the elements of equality mentioned: (1) no difference in sex; (2) no difference in age; and (3) no difference in social standing (cf. Rom 3:22; 1Co 12:13; Gal 3:28; Col 3:11). God will pour out His Spirit on all mankind. This inclusion is a fulfillment of Moses’ prayer in Num 11:29 and a sign that the New covenant has come (cf. Jer 31:34).
The inclusion may also reflect the fact that all ages and both sexes had been called to the special holy convocation for repentance (cf. Joe 2:16). Now all of them would receive the Spirit!
It is surely true that in context this refers to the covenant people, but in the NT (Peter’s use of this text in Acts 2) the covenant people is widened to include all people (cf. Rom 2:28-29; Rom 9:6; Gal 3:7-9; Gal 3:29; Gal 6:16; 1Pe 3:6; Rev 5:9-10; Rev 7:9; Rev 14:6). See Special Topic at Joe 2:32.
The mutuality of Gen 1:26-27 is restored. All flesh comes to YHWH (cf. Isa 66:23)! This has always been the goal!! This is demonstrated by prophecy through dreams and visions (Joe 2:28-29). See Special Topic below.
SPECIAL TOPIC: WOMEN IN THE BIBLE
Joe 2:30-32 This is apocalyptic language (see D. Brent Sandy and Ronald L. Giese, Jr., Cracking Old Testament Codes, pp. 177-196) attempting to describe God breaking into history either for judgment or blessing! See Special Topic below.
SPECIAL TOPIC: APOCALYPTIC LITERATURE
Joe 2:31 will be turned This VERB (BDB 245, KB 253, Niphal IMPERFECT) is often used of
1. YHWH overturning the wicked
2. YHWH transforming nature
a. mountains, cf. Job 9:5
b. floods, cf. Job 12:15; Psa 66:6
c. natural cycles of light and dark, cf. Joe 2:31; Amo 5:10
3. YHWH turning festival into mourning, cf. Amo 8:10
4. YHWH turning mourning into dancing, Psa 30:11
5. YHWH turning mourning into joy, cf. Jer 31:13
6. YHWH changing the wicked, cf. Zep 3:9
comes This (BDB 97, KB 112, Qal INFINITIVE CONSTRUCT) is used several times to denote the coming of the day of the Lord, especially in the post-exilic prophets (cf. Zec 14:1; Mal 4:5; and also Isa 13:9). YHWH is coming to be with His people. For some that will mean judgment and for some restoration. The goal has always been God with His people (i.e., Emmanuel). The purpose of creation was an intimate personal relationship between the Creator and His special creation (cf. Gen 1:26-27). The fellowship of Eden (Genesis 1-2) will be restored (Revelation 21-22). Everything from Genesis 3 through Revelation 20 is God cleaning up the mess of human rebellion.
F. F. Bruce, Questions and Answers, p. 75, makes a good point about this apocalyptic language having been partially fulfilled in the supernatural darkness that accompanied Jesus’ death in Jerusalem. Peter’s hearers on Pentecost would have recognized
1. the OT apocalyptic imagery
2. the recent literal fulfillment
Joe 2:32 whoever calls on the name of the LORD In an OT setting this denotes an act of personal, public, covenantal affirmation (i.e., Gen 4:26; Gen 12:8; Psa 116:4). It was a liturgical way of asserting one’s trust in the covenant God of Israel and His word, promises, and warnings.
This phrase is used several times in the NT: (1) Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost, Act 2:14-21; Act 2:27-30; (2) Peter’s message to Cornelius, Act 10:45; (3) Paul’s emphasis in Rom 10:13. See Special Topic: The Name of YHWH and Special Topic: The Name of the Lord .
If this new day of salvation, this new age of the Spirit, this Messianic period, has begun, why is there still sin and suffering?
To answer this question, see the Special Topic following and also Gordon Fee and Doug Stuart’s How To Read The Bible For All Its Worth, pp. 145-148.
TOPIC: THIS AGE AND THE AGE TO COME
LORD In context this refers to the Covenant name for God, YHWH. See Special Topic: Names for Deity . However, in the NT (cf. Rom 10:13) it refers to Jesus the Messiah. This is a tremendous invitation of salvation to all mankind who will trust in the trustworthiness of God, which is fully revealed in Jesus the Messiah.
Will be delivered The VERB (BDB 572, KB 589, Niphal IMPERFECT) can mean
1. escape, Jdg 3:29; 1Sa 19:10; 1Sa 19:12; 1Sa 19:18; Jer 46:6; Jer 48:8; Jer 48:19; Joe 2:32; Amo 9:1; Mal 3:15
2. be delivered/rescued, Jdg 6:23; 2Sa 19:9; Psa 22:5; Psa 107:19; Pro 28:26
When this concept of physical deliverance by God’s power is brought into the NT the spiritual aspect becomes predominant. The deliverance is still accomplished by God’s Spirit, but it is not for a period of time, but for eternity!
As the LORD has said
Even among the survivors whom the LORD calls It is uncertain to what OT text Joel is referring. It seems that this same statement is mentioned in Oba 1:17. See Introduction, Date.
There are two theological issues in this statement:
1. The remnant theology – God will maintain a faithful remnant through time and judgment. His desire to redeem all the nations depends on a continuing witness to the covenant God!
2. Predestination – There is an eternal redemptive plan which involves national Israel and the nations.
SPECIAL TOPIC: THE REMNANT, THREE SENSES
SPECIAL TOPIC: YHWY’s ETERNAL REDEMPTIVE PLAN
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
This is a study guide commentary which means that you are responsible for your own interpretation of the Bible. Each of us must walk in the light we have. You, the Bible, and the Holy Spirit are priority in interpretation. You must not relinquish this to a commentator.
These discussion questions are provided to help you think through the major issues of this section of the book. They are meant to be thought provoking, not definitive.
1. Is the day of the LORD for judgment or blessing?
2. Why does Joel use a locust plague to describe God’s judgment?
3. What is significant about the definition of God found in Joe 2:13?
4. Why is Joe 2:23 such a translation problem?
5. What does Joe 2:28 have to say to our day concerning the question of women in the ministry?
Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley
afterward: i.e. after the “good bestowed” had begun to be enjoyed (Joe 2:21-27 for the nation had been restored under Ezra and Nehemiah; “the light had sprung up” (Isa 42:7. Mat 4:12-16. Luk 2:32); “the days of the Son of Man” were then present (Luk 17:22). “Afterward” would come the days of the Spirit; and “this is that” which was area on “the day of Pentecost”, when Joe 2:28, Joe 2:29 began to be fulfilled. Had the nation repented at the summons of Peter in Act 3:18-26, “all things which God bad spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets” would have been fulfilled, including Joe 2:30, Joe 2:31-32, (S and R). Mal 4:5 also would have been taken of John the Baptist if they had received it (Mat 11:14): the Hebrew ‘acharei-ken always referring to what follows.
I will pour out My spirit. Note the Figure of speech Epanadiplosis (App-6) used to emphasise the statement included within this sentence, and the repetition of it at the end of Joe 2:29.
spirit. Hebrew. ruach. App-9. This must be put by Figure of speech Metonymy (of Cause), App-6, for the “power from on high”, or spiritual gifts. See note on Act 2:4. God the Holy Spirit cannot be “poured out”.
all flesh. Put by Figure of speech Synecdoche (of Genus), App-6, for all sorts and conditions of men, as described in the words which follow.
and your daughters. Women are not excluded from spiritual gifts.
prophesy. Not necessarily foretelling, but forthtelling, by speaking for God. Only such as were thus called and gifted could be His spokesmen. Compare Num 11:16, Num 11:17, Num 11:29. See App-78.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Joe 2:28-32
III. THE PURPOSE OF REPENTANCE (contd)
FUTURE BLESSINGS
(GOD PREPARING A NEW PEOPLE)
TEXT: Joe 2:28-32
With one dramatic sweep of the brush this prophet-artist has graphically portrayed the entire scope of the Messianic age from its beginning with the pouring out of the Spirit, to the working of God during this age in fearful phenomena calling men to repent, to the conclusion of the age at the great and terrible day of Jehovah.
Joe 2:28-29 . . . AFTERWARD . . . I WILL POUR OUT MY SPIRIT UPON ALL FLESH . . . SONS AND DAUGHTERS SHALL PROPHESY . . . OLD MEN . . . YOUNG MEN . . . SERVANTS AND . . . HANDMAIDS . . . Although a veil of discontinuity obscures this whole section (Joe 2:28-32), the ideas in the prophecy are definite. It is the time element, the near and the distant blended into one picture, which is temporarily disconcerting.
Zerr: Joe 2:28. This verse begins a noted prophecy which includes the rest of the chapter. It was quoted by the apostle Peter as recorded in Act 2:17-21, where he replies to the false statements of the Jews in his audience. Afterward is a somewhat indefinite term as to time, merely meaning at some time later.* Peter makes it more definite by saying “in the last days meaning the last days of the Jewish Dispensation. It is not uncommon for ail Old Testament prophet to pass immediately from some good event concerning fleshly Israel to one pertaining to spiritual Israel. So in the present case, Joel goes from the return from captivity to the starting of the church that was lo embrace all nations in spiritual Israel. The meaning of all flesh is that the spirit, of God was to bring blessings upon all, whether they were Jew or Gentile. These blessings would need to be introduced into the world in a miraculous manner, and it was to be accomplished by the gifts of the Holy Spirit, using various ranks of society for instruments, hence the mention of sons and daughters, old and young men upon whom the outpouring was to come. Joe 2:29. Servants and handmaids are named to show that the blessings of the Gospel will be for all classes of mankind, whether high or low, rich or poor.
The inspired pronouncement as to the fulfillment of this prophecy is the final authority. There can be no question that Joels prophecy began to have its fulfillment on the day of Pentecost as recorded in Acts 2, for the inspired apostle declares it to be so. In the Old Dispensation particular members of the covenant people received special dispensations of the Spirit, but in the New, Messianic Dispensation, the Spirit would be poured out on people of all races, as many as would call upon the name of the Lord. Calling on the name of the Lord is, of course, synonymous with believing, repenting and obeying in baptism as is shown in Act 22:16 when Paul was exhorted to call on His name by being baptized! In other words, Joel says that all who become Christian (who call upon the name of Jehovah) will receive the Spirit of God. Peter confirms it by saying Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For unto you is the promise and unto those who are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call unto Him. (Acts 2)
That this general giving of the Spirit to all believers was not to be accomplished until the establishment of the church is at once evident from the words in Joh 7:38 . . . for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified . . . Peters words in Acts 2 also confirm the fact that this outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh was to continue even to those afar off (the Gentiles), even as many as God would call.
Joel specifically states that the Spirit will come without limitation as to age, sex or race. The only limitation is that those who expect to receive it must call upon the name of the Lord (Joe 2:32). The outpouring of Gods Spirit upon slaves (servants and handmaids) is something extraordinary for not a single case occurs in the entire O.T. of a slave receiving the Spirit or gift of prophecy. Even the Jewish expositors could not reconcile themselves to this announcement. The translators of the Septuagint substituted servants of God in place of slaves of men in this text.
That these who have called upon the name of the Lord and have received the Spirit of God would prophesy, dream dreams and see visions could mean either of two things or both. It undoubtedly means that some in the Messianic age would receive special gifts of the Spirit to prophesy or to receive direct, infallible revelations of Gods will through dreams and visions, We know from the historical record of the New Testament that this is so. There were even some women who prophesied (Act 21:9). But we believe the word prophesy is also used in a general sense to mean that all in the Messianic age who receive the gift of the Spirit will go everywhere preaching and teaching the revealed will of God (Act 8:4). We do know from the figurative and hyperbolical usage of language in the Bible that it is not necessary to assume that when Joel says your sons and daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions . . . thus all who receive the indwelling presence of the Spirit and become Christians will be given direct dream or vision revelations from God. All who become Christians will receive the Spirit, but only some of the sons and daughters would receive the special, miraculous gifts of prophecy, visions, dreams, etc. If we let the New Testament interpret the Old Testament we will know what Joel means.
The important point of this passage is often missed in an effort to dogmatize or theologize about miraculous gifts of the Spirit. The important point is that in the latter days that is, in the Messianic age the fulfillment of Gods covenant promises-the pouring out of His Spirit-would come to all people. It would no longer be a covenant restricted to a certain nation but to men of every tongue and tribe who would call upon Him in trustful obedience. God was going to do something unique in the Messianic age (Isa 43:19) and this would be the pouring out of the Spirit from on high (Isa 32:15)-the creating of a new Spirit and a new heart within man (Eze 11:19; Eze 18:31; Eze 36:26 ff; Eze 37:1-28 and Zec 12:10).
This outpouring of the Spirit of God, as Peter interprets it, ushers in the Messianic age. Furthermore, as Peter declares, all during this age, men of every race and station who call upon the name of the Lord will receive the indwelling Spirit. If we will but follow the inspired apostles interpretation we will see that Joels prophecy was not limited only to the special, miraculous gifts of the Spirit.
Joe 2:30-32 AND I WILL SHOW WONDERS IN THE HEAVENS AND IN THE EARTH . . . BEFORE THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE DAY OF JEHOVAH COMETH . . . AND IT SHALL COME TO PASS, THAT WHOSOEVER SHALL CALL ON THE NAME OF JEHOVAH SHALL BE DELIVERED; . . . In highly figurative language Joel tells both the people of his day and all generations that during this entire Messianic age God will be showing wonders in the heavens and in the earth; blood and fire, and pillars of smoke. This, as is evident from the context, will be one of the means by which God will call men to repent in preparation for the great and terrible day of Jehovah. It is without question that these wonders are to transpire before that great and terrible day, so they must be before the second and final coming of Jesus Christ who comes on that terrible day to judge all who have not called upon the name of Jehovah. These wonders are both natural disasters and human holocausts. God certainly sent a warning upon an impenitent Jewish nation which had rejected the Messiah when He destroyed their city and their nation in 70 A.D. (cf. Mat 24:1-28). God has also permitted nation after nation to be destroyed in blood, fire and smoke because of ungodliness. He has permitted the forces of the heavens (nature) to carry out His warning judgments upon the earth (cf. comments on Joe 2:1 ff).
Zerr: Joe 2:30. Blood, fire, etc., is figurative and refers to the disturbances that were to occur in close connection (as to time) with the outpouring of the Spirit. Joe 2:31. This verse is still figurative but is more specific than the preceding one. It was fulfilled when Jesus was on the cross and the sun was prevented from showing its light for three hours (Mat 27:45), This was only 50 days before the giving of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, which would give to the language here the cleaning as if it said the event would occur just before the day of the Lord. Terrible is from the Hebrew word ya.be, one of whose meanings is to be reverenced; and certainly that can truly be said of the day when the Lord gave to the world the kingdom that was to stand for ever.” Joe 2:32. Shall he delivered is expressed by shall be saved in Acts 2; Acts 21, which shows that the two expressions mean the same. To call on the name of the Lord, means to look to Him for the means of salvation. (See Act 22:16; Rom 10:13.) Mount Zion and Jerusalem are named together because the former was a special spot in the latter city. Deliverance means the same as be saved in Act 2:21. Remnant is from sariyd, which Strong defines a survivor.” It is said with reference to the Jews who were to be still serving God at the time the Spirit was to be given. It is true that the benefits of the Gospel were for all nations, but the Jews were given the first opportunity of receiving them. (See Act 13:46; Rom 1:16; Rom 2:10.)
Then at the end of the ages, the great and terrible day of the Lord shall come (Joe 2:31). God will call during the entire Christian age through Spirit filled men proclaiming His word and by sending terrifying wonders in the heavens and on the earth; and then suddenly, without warning the consummation of the ages.
For those who call upon the name of the Lord (Joe 2:32) this day of the Lord will be one of deliverance. Their faith and their works will be vindicated. They shall receive an eternal weight of glory when they are recognized and glorified by God Himself. But for those who do not call upon His name in faith and obedience shall be His perfect, divine wrath.
Keil and Delitzschs statement here will help to clarify our interpretation:
For the signs in heaven and earth that are mentioned in Joe 2:30-31 were to take place before the coming of the terrible day of the Lord, which would dawn after the outpouring of the Spirit of God upon all flesh, and which came, as history teaches, upon the Jewish nation that had rejected its Saviour on the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, and upon the Gentile world-power in the destruction of the Roman empire, and from that time forward breaks in constant succession upon one Gentile nation after another; until all the ungodly powers of this world shall be overthrown (cf. Ch. Joe 3:2). On account of this internal connection between the day of Jehovah and the outpouring of the Spirit upon the church of the Lord, Peter also quoted Joe 2:30-32 of this prophecy, for the purpose of impressing upon the hearts of all the hearers of his address the admonition, Save yourselves from this perverse generation (Act 2:40), and also of pointing out the way of deliverance from the threatening judgment to all who were willing to be saved.
So Joel, blending the events of the Messianic age into one picture with the near and the distant painted like mountain peaks and ranges seen from a distance, does not portray for us the valleys of centuries of time between the mountain-top-events. This is what is called the shortened perspective of prophetic literature. It should caution us to pay more attention to what the prophets preach of the fundamentals of faith and practice and much less to what prophecy may seem to say about times and seasons.
In the Messianic age God intended to bless all who would answer His call in Christ Jesus with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. For it was in the New Testament dispensation that He set forth in Christ . . . a plan for the fulness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. It is in Christ that men of all races have heard the word of truth, the gospel of . . . salvation, and have believed in him, and were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit . . . Yes, Ephesians, chapter one, is the completed revelation of that which Joel wrote in long ages past!
Questions
1. When did the pouring out of the Spirit of God on all flesh take place? Is it still taking place?
2. Does this promise of Joel mean that all Christians should expect to prophesy, receive revelations by dreams, and have visions? Why not?
3. What and when are the wonders in heaven and on earth?
4. How does God call the remnant?
5. Why do we say it is not important that men should attempt to force these great mountain-top events into a rigid schedule of times and seasons?
6. How is Ephesians I a completed revelation of this section of Joel?
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Finally the prophet moved on to a yet higher level, and dealt wholly with things to come. The great word introducing the section is “afterward.” Some of the things foretold have now been fulfilled, some are still in the future.
In looking toward the distant Day of Jehovah, Joel saw an intervening period of an entirely different character. This he described, ending his message with a declaration concerning the Day of the Lord, which was the real burden on his spirit. Of the intervening period he declared that its initiation would result from the outpouring of the Spirit upon all flesh. It would be characterized by prophecy, dreams, and visions. The signs of the end of this period and the approach of the Day of the Lord would be “wonders in the heavens and in the earth.” From the terrors of the Day, those who called on the name of the Lord were to be delivered.
This is a perfect description of the Pentecostal age in which we now live, with a statement of the signs which will precede its end and a declaration of the way of deliverance from the terrors immediately to follow.
Finally the prophet saw in the far distance the ultimate Day of Jehovah. The last vision of the prophet is the complete fulfilment of the divine purpose in and through God’s people, in which Jehovah will dwell in Ziona city holy and full of prosperity.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
The Valley of Decision
Joe 2:28-32; Joe 3:1-21
Having stated the outward blessings that would follow repentance, Joel unveils the extraordinary spiritual blessings that were in store. The outpouring of the Spirit, described in Act 2:16-17, does not exhaust these glorious words. This blessing is for all whom the Lord our God shall call to Himself, and as one to whom His call has come, you have a perfect right to claim your share in Pentecost. The promise is to all that are afar off in space and time. The very slaves, the most degraded and despised of men, become free when they yield themselves to Jesus and have an equal right to the same Spirit.
Joe 3:1-21 refers to the last desperate effort made by the powers of the world against Christ and His people. This will be the closing scene of mans apostasy. But the Lord will vindicate and deliver His oppressed from the hand of their oppressors; and the same judgment will bring them blessing. Having cleansed His people from their stains, Messiah will tabernacle among them, Rev 21:3.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
afterward
Cf. Act 2:17 which gives a specific interpretation of “afterward” (Heb. acherith= “latter,” “last”). “Afterward” in Joel Joe 2:28 means “in the last days” (Greek – ), and has a partial and continuous fulfilment during the “last days” which began with the first advent of Christ Heb 1:2 but the greater fulfilment awaits the “last days” as applied to Israel. (See Scofield “Act 2:17”), for phrase, “the last days.” See Scofield “Act 2:17”.
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
that I: Pro 1:23, Isa 32:15, Isa 44:3, Eze 39:29, Joh 7:39, Act 2:16-18
upon: Isa 40:5, Isa 49:6, Zec 12:10, Luk 3:6, Act 2:2-4, Act 2:33, Act 2:39, Act 10:44-47, Act 11:15-18, Act 15:7, Act 15:8
your daughters: Isa 54:13, Act 21:9, Gal 3:28
dream: Gen 37:5-10, Num 12:6, Jer 23:28
Reciprocal: Num 11:17 – I will take Num 11:25 – they prophesied Jdg 4:4 – General 1Sa 19:20 – when they 1Sa 19:21 – prophesied also Isa 45:8 – Drop down Jer 23:25 – dreamed Jer 29:11 – thoughts Eze 1:1 – I saw Eze 2:2 – General Eze 36:27 – I will Eze 37:14 – shall put Dan 7:1 – Daniel Hos 12:10 – multiplied Joe 2:23 – the former Mat 1:20 – in Mat 11:3 – Art Mar 1:8 – he shall Luk 1:67 – filled Luk 3:16 – he shall Luk 11:13 – give the Luk 24:44 – in the prophets Luk 24:49 – I send Joh 16:13 – he will show Act 1:5 – but Act 2:38 – and ye Act 11:16 – but 1Co 12:10 – prophecy 2Co 3:8 – the ministration 2Co 12:1 – visions Gal 3:14 – might Eph 1:13 – holy 1Ti 6:2 – partakers Tit 2:6 – Young Tit 3:6 – he shed Heb 1:1 – in 1Pe 1:12 – sent 1Jo 2:13 – young
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THE OUTPOURED SPIRIT
I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh.
Joe 2:28
Joel sees in the national calamity a sign and harbinger of the Day of the Lord, to which all things are tending. To prepare for that great and terrible Day he foretells the pouring forth of Gods Spirit upon the whole people, so as to create not one prophet but a nation of prophets. It was this prediction which St. Peter quoted to the Jews on the day of Pentecost, as fulfilled in the gift of the Holy Ghost, then shed abroad without respect of persons.
I. No side of modern theology is more defective than that which treats of the doctrine of the Holy Spirit.We have, on the one hand, frigid re-statements of orthodox formulas as to the Third Person in the Trinity. We have, on the other hand, loose descriptions of individual experience in regard to what is known as the baptism of the Holy Ghost. But little has been done, or even attempted, by our deepest Christian thinkers to correlate spiritual theory and spiritual experience,so that each shall instruct the otheras to this most profound, most difficult, and yet most practical subject.
II. Most practicalfor the doctrine deals with that wherein God touches man most closely and familiarly in his everyday life.St. Basil, one of the old Greek fathers, has pointed out that the Holy Spirit whom we name last in our doxologies, is our first point of contact with God in the order of experience. By receiving His gifts we come into relation with the Distributor; then we come to consider the Sender; then we carry back our thought to the Fount and Cause of good. The way of the knowledge of God is from one Spirit, by the one Son, to the one Father.
III. The Holy Ghost, who is the Lord and Giver of life, quickens everything which lives.What we call nature consists of the manifold forms in which He has concealed His source. Yet since His special attribute is holiness, He dwells and works pre-eminently in those creatures who, being spirits, are capable of holiness. He brings them into the unity of a common experience, and creates in them the fellowship of a purified character.
IV. Revival means giving new life.If God can give life, He can surely add life. Regeneration is nothing in principle but the adding of more life. It is God adding life to lifemore life to a man who has some life. The man has life which God gave him once; but part of himthe best part of himis dead. His soul is dead in trespasses and sins. God touches this, and it lives. Even as the body was dead and God breathed upon it till it lived, so God will breathe upon the soul and more life and better life will come.
V. The true idea of the inspiration of an individual is that the Spirit does not suspend or supersede individuality, but rather quickens and intensifies it.His advent into the soul brings a Divine energy which vitalises the noblest faculties of our nature and inspires new hopes and longings which become the prophecy of their own fulfilment. As we are convinced in regard to the reality of sin and the possibility of righteousness and the certainty of judgment, we rise to a new view of human destiny.
VI. Christianity, from first to last, is instinct with the supernatural.In our faith, in our repentance, in our consecration, we are only fellow-workers with God. The Bible presupposes that its Author Himself will constantly interpret its message to those who read. The Church was born at Pentecost, and only lives in perpetual Whitsuntide. The missionary goes out in faith that the most benighted heathen has an inward ray of Divine light.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Joe 2:28. This verse begins a noted prophecy which includes the rest of the chapter. It was quoted by the apostle Peter as recorded in Act 2:17-21, where he replies to the false statements of the Jews in his audience. Afterward is a somewhat indefinite term as to time, merely meaning at some time later.* Peter makes it more definite by saying “in the last days meaning the last days of the Jewish Dispensation. It is not uncommon for ail Old Testament prophet to pass immediately from some good event concerning fleshly Israel to one pertaining to spiritual Israel. So in the present case, Joel goes from the return from captivity to the starting of the church that was lo embrace all nations in spiritual Israel. The meaning of all flesh is that the spirit, of God was to bring blessings upon all, whether they were Jew or Gentile. These bless-ings would need to be introduced into the world in a miraculous manner, and it was to be accomplished by the gifts of the Holy Spirit, using various ranks of society for instruments, hence the mention of sons and daughters, old and young men upon whom the outpouring was to come.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Joe 2:28-29. And it shall come to pass afterward Some versions begin the third chapter with this verse; and indeed the subject which is begun here is of so different a nature from what goes before, that it seems evident a new chapter ought to be begun here. The Jewish Rabbi Kimchi says here, that the expression afterward signifies the same as in the latter days, Isa 2:2, and that whenever the words occur, they denote the times of the Messiah; and therefore he refers this prophecy to his days, and makes it descriptive of the event which is foretold Isa 11:9, The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord. This is unquestionably the true meaning of it, and thus it is explained by St. Peter, Act 2:17. And though the things here prophesied of were not to happen till several ages afterward, yet was the prophecy highly proper to encourage the minds of the pious Jews; as it was an assurance to them that, let them be brought ever so low by this or any other calamity, yet God would preserve them a people, till all the promises made to their forefathers should be actually accomplished; and especially till the Messiah should come, under whom the knowledge of God should spread itself among all the nations of the earth, and the gifts of the Spirit of God should be poured out in a much more abundant manner than ever they were before: see Chandler. I will pour out my Spirit In extraordinary gifts on the first preachers of the gospel, and in various graces on all believers; upon all flesh Upon believing Gentiles, as well as believing Jews. In former times those gifts were confined to one particular nation, but now they shall be extended to those of all nations that will apply unto God for them through faith in the Messiah. The plentiful effusion of the Holy Spirit is often represented by the prophets as the peculiar character of the gospel state, and is elsewhere compared to the pouring out of waters upon the thirsty ground, and thereby rendering it fruitful: see the passages referred to in the margin, and compare them with Joh 7:39. That this prophecy was in a great measure fulfilled in the days of the apostles and first messengers of the Lord Jesus, we have abundant proof from the Acts of the Apostles and the epistles of the New Testament. We need not, however, confine this prophecy to those early times, but, since many prophecies have gradual completions, we may understand this as implying that there shall be another remarkable effusion of the Holy Spirit upon the Jews, in order to their conversion in the latter times of the world. This exposition, which is favoured by some expressions in this prophecy, renders its connection with the contents of the following chapter more manifest. And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy The gift of prophecy was bestowed upon some women under the Old Testament, as upon Miriam, Exo 15:20; upon Deborah, Jdg 4:14; and Huldah, 2Ki 22:14.
But this gift was more frequently conferred upon that sex in the times of the New Testament. Thus we read of four daughters of Philip the Evangelist who prophesied, Act 21:9; and church history affords us several other instances; such as Perpetua and Felicitas, who were martyrs for the Christian faith; Potamiena, mentioned by Eusebius, lib. 4. cap. 5, and others. Your old men shall dream dreams Divine dreams, either imparting unto them the knowledge of future events, or discovering to them the will of God in other respects. By this method God often made known his will to the patriarchs and prophets, impressing their minds, while they were asleep, with the things he intended to communicate; sometimes directly, without any parabolical representation, which was a pure dream; as to Solomon and others: sometimes under representations and images, which might be a vision and dream mixed, as in the case of Pharaoh, Joseph, Daniel, and others. Your young men shall see visions In visions, distinguished from dreams, the inspired person was awake, but his external senses being bound up, and, as it were, laid in a trance, (see Num 24:4,) he had a distinct knowledge of the things revealed to him, and that sometimes accompanied with external representations: such was that vision of St. Peters, mentioned Act 10:11. And in this way St. John seems to have received all his revelations. From visions being applied to young men, and dreams to old men, some have observed that the imagination is stronger in those that are young than in the old; so that their senses need not be bound up with sleep, in order to make them capable of receiving heavenly visions. Also upon the servants and upon the handmaids Even persons of the lowest condition shall be made partakers of the saving graces of the Holy Spirit, and in many instances also of his extraordinary gifts. The poor have the gospel preached to them, and all the blessings of the gospel, whether ordinary or extraordinary, are as free for the poor as the rich, and are more commonly desired and received by them than by the rich.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Joe 2:28-32. The Portents of the Day of Yahweh.The deliverance from the locusts is but a harbinger of the time coming when Yahweh will impart His spirit to all Jewsfor to such the context evidently restricts all fleshso that without distinction of age, sex, or social position, they shall have the ecstatic vision and utterance which mark the prophetall Yahwehs people shall be prophets. The earth shall be filled with the bloodshed of war, and from burning cities shall columns of smoke ascend; the very luminaries shall be dark and lurid at the approach of the dread Day of Yahweh. But from its terrors all the worshippers of Yahweh shall escape.
Joe 2:28. spirit: the divine life-energy. For the conception cf. Num 11:29.
Joe 2:32. shall call on the name of the Lord: rather, does call. The expression, meaning to invoke Yahweh, is the technical one for describing the worshippers of Yahweh. It is these, whom Yahweh callsnot such as in terror call to Yahweh for helpwho shall be saved.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
2:28 And it shall come to pass afterward, [that] I will pour {q} out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream {r} dreams, your young men shall see visions:
(q) That is, in greater abundance, and more broadly than in times past. And this was fulfilled under Christ, when God’s graces and his Spirit under the Gospel were abundantly given to the Church; Isa 44:3 Act 2:17 Joh 7:38-39 .
(r) As they had visions and dreams in ancient times, so will they now have clearer revelations.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
A. Israel’s spiritual renewal and deliverance 2:28-32
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
After this, namely, after the deliverance from the northern invader just described, God promised to pour out His Spirit on all the Israelites without gender, age, class, or position distinctions. Other similar promises identify the Israelites as the recipients of the Spirit (e.g., Eze 36:27; Eze 39:29; Zec 12:10), and here "your sons and daughters" (i.e., Israelites) are the object of this blessing. God never gave His Spirit to unbelievers, so believing Israelites are in view. Amillennialists believe that all flesh means all believers, namely, believing Jews and Gentiles in the church. [Note: E.g., Dillard, p. 295. Cf. Hubbard, p. 73.] They change the meaning of what Joel said. In Old Testament times God gave His Spirit only to select individuals (cf. Num 11:24-29; 1Sa 10:10-11; 1Sa 19:20-24), but in the future everyone (i.e., all believers) would prophesy and receive revelations from the Lord. Prophesying often describes praising God in the Bible (cf. 1Ch 25:1-3), so that may be in view here. Visions and dreams were God’s customary ways of giving special revelations to people in Old Testament times (cf. Num 12:6). Normally the absence of prophetic revelation indicated sin and divine judgment, but the presence of such revelation reflected divine blessing (cf. 1Sa 3:1; Amo 8:11). So a universal bestowal of the Spirit indicates a time of unprecedented divine blessing. This would be the fulfillment of Moses’ desire (Num 11:29; cf. Isa 32:15; Isa 44:3-4; Eze 36:27-28; Eze 37:14; Eze 39:29; Zec 12:10).
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
IV. A FAR FUTURE DAY OF THE LORD: ANOTHER HUMAN INVASION AND DELIVERANCE 2:28-3:21
The preceding promises foreshadowed even greater deliverance and blessing for the Israelites in their far distant future. The clues to a leap to the distant future in the prophet’s perspective are the words "after this" (Joe 2:28), "in those days" (Joe 2:29), "the great and awesome day of the Lord" (Joe 2:31; cf. Joe 2:11), "in those days and at that time" (Joe 3:1), and "in that day" (Joe 3:18).
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
2. THE OUTPOURING OF THE SPIRIT
Joe 2:28-32
Upon these promises of physical blessing there follows another of the pouring forth of the Spirit: the prophecy by which Joel became the Prophet of Pentecost, and through which his book is best known among Christians.
When fertility has been restored to the land, the seasons again run their normal courses, and the people eat their food and be full-“It shall come to pass after these things, I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh”. The order of events makes us pause to question: does Joel mean to imply that physical prosperity must precede spiritual fullness? It would be unfair to assert that he does, without remembering what he understands by the physical blessings. To Joel these are the token that God has returned to His people. The drought and the famine produced by the locusts were signs of His anger and of His divorce of the land. The proofs that He has relented, and taken Israel back into a spiritual relation to Himself, can, therefore, from Joels point of view, only be given by the healing of the peoples wounds. In plenteous rains and full harvests God sets His seal to mans penitence. Rain and harvest are not merely physical benefits, but religious sacraments: signs that God has returned to His people, and that His zeal is again stirred on their behalf. {Joe 1:18} This has to be made clear before there can be talk of any higher blessing. God has to return to His people and to show His love for them before He pours forth His Spirit upon them. That is what Joel intends by the order he pursues, and not that a certain stage of physical comfort is indispensable to a high degree of spiritual feeling and experience. The early and latter rains, the fullness of corn, wine, and oil, are as purely religious to Joel, though not so highly religious, as the phenomena of the Spirit in men.
But though that be an adequate answer to our question so far as Joel himself is concerned, it does not exhaust the question with regard to history in general. From Joels own standpoint physical blessings may have been as religious as spiritual; but we must go further, and assert that for Joels anticipation of the baptism of the Spirit by a return of prosperity there is an ethical reason and one which is permanently valid in history. A certain degree of prosperity, and even of comfort, is an indispensable condition of that universal and lavish exercise of the religious faculties, which Joel pictures under the pouring forth of Gods Spirit.
The history of prophecy itself furnishes us with proofs of this. When did prophecy most flourish in Israel? When had the Spirit of God most freedom in developing the intellectual and moral nature of Israel? Not when the nation was struggling with the conquest and settlement of the land, not when it was engaged with the embarrassments and privations of the Syrian wars; but an Amos, a Hosea, an Isaiah came forth at the end of the long, peaceful, and prosperous reigns of Jeroboam II and Uzziah. The intellectual strength and liberty of the great Prophet of the Exile, his deep insight into Gods purposes and his large view of the future, had not been possible without the security and comparative prosperity of the Jews in Babylon, from among whom he wrote. In Haggai and Zechariah, on the other hand, who worked in the hunger-bitten colony of returned exiles, there was no such fullness of the Spirit. Prophecy, we saw, was then starved by the poverty and meanness of the national life from which it rose. All this is very explicable. When men are stunned by such a calamity as Joel describes, or when they are engrossed by the daily struggle with bitter enemies and a succession of bad seasons, they may feel the need of penitence and be able to speak with decision upon the practical duty of the moment, to a degree not attainable in better days, but they lack the leisure, the freedom, and the resources amid which their various faculties of mind and soul can alone respond to the Spirit influence.
Has it been otherwise in the history of Christianity? Our Lord Himself found His first disciples, not in a hungry and ragged community, but amid the prosperity and opulence of Galilee. They left all to follow Him and achieved their ministry, in poverty and persecution, but they brought to that ministry the force of minds and bodies trained in a very fertile land and by a prosperous commerce. Paul, in his apostolate, sustained himself by the labor of his hands, but he was the child of a rich civilization and the citizen of a great empire. The Reformation was preceded by the Renaissance, and on the Continent of Europe drew its forces, not from the enslaved and impoverished populations of Italy and Southern Austria, but from the large civic and commercial centers of Germany. An acute historian, in his recent lectures on the “Economic Interpretation of History,” observes that every religious revival in England has happened upon a basis of comparative prosperity. He has proved “the opulence of Norfolk during the epoch of Lollardy,” and pointed out that “the Puritan movement was essentially and originally one of the middle classes, of the traders in towns and of the farmers in the country”; that the religious state of the Church of England was never so low as among the servile and beggarly clergy of the seventeenth and part of the eighteenth centuries; that the Nonconformist bodies who kept religion alive during this period were closely identified with the leading movements of trade and finance; and that even Wesleys great revival of religion among the laboring classes of England took place at a time when prices were far lower than in the previous century, wages had slightly risen and “most laborers were small occupiers; there was therefore in the comparative plenty of the time an opening for a religious movement among the poor, and Wesley was equal to the occasion.” He might have added that the great missionary movement of the nineteenth century is contemporaneous with the enormous advance of our commerce and our empire.
On the whole, then, the witness of history is uniform. Poverty and persecution, “famine, nakedness, peril, and sword,” put a keenness upon the spirit of religion, while luxury rots its very fibers; but a stable basis of prosperity is indispensable to every social and religious reform, and Gods Spirit finds fullest course in communities of a certain degree of civilization and of freedom from sordidness.
We may draw from this an impressive lesson for our own day. Joel predicts that, upon the new prosperity of his land, the lowest classes of society shall be permeated by the spirit of prophecy. Is it not part of the secret of the failure of Christianity to enlist large portions of our population, that the basis of their life is so sordid and insecure? Have we not yet to learn from the Hebrew prophets that some amount of freedom in a people and some amount of health are indispensable to a revival of religion? Lives which are strained and starved, lives which are passed in rank discomfort and under grinding poverty, without the possibility of the independence of the individual or of the sacredness of the home, cannot be religious except in the most rudimentary sense of the word. For the revival of energetic religion among such lives we must wait for a better distribution, not of wealth, but of the bare means of comfort, leisure, and security. When, to our penitence and our striving, God restores the years which the locust has eaten, when the social plagues of rich mens selfishness and the poverty of the very poor are lifted from us, then may we look for the fulfillment of Joels prediction-“even upon all the slaves and upon the handmaidens will I pour out My Spirit in those days.”
The economic problem, therefore, has also its place in the warfare for the kingdom of God.
“And it shall be that after such things, I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; And your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, Your young men shall see visions: And even upon all the slaves and the handmaidens in those days will I pour out My Spirit. And I will set signs in heaven and on earth, Blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall he turned to darkness, And the moon to blood, Before the coming of the Day of Jehovah, the great and the awful. And it shall be that every one who calls on the name of Jehovah shall be saved: For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be a remnant, as Jehovah hath spoken, And among the fugitives those whom Jehovah calleth.”
This prophecy divides into two parts-the outpouring of the Spirit, and the appearance of the terrible Day of the Lord.
The Spirit of God is to be poured “on all flesh,” says the prophet. By this term, which is sometimes applied to all things that breathe, and sometimes to mankind as a whole, Joel means Israel only: the heathen are to be destroyed, Nor did Peter, when he quoted the passage at the Day of Pentecost, mean anything more. He spoke to Jews and proselytes: “for the promise is to you and your children, and to them that are afar off”: it was not till afterwards that he discovered that the Holy Ghost was granted to the Gentiles, and then he was unready for the revelation and surprised by it. {Act 10:45} But within Joels Israel the operation of the Spirit was to be at once thorough and universal. All classes would be affected, and affected so that the simplest and rudest would become prophets.
The limitation was therefore not without its advantages. In the earlier stages of all religions it is impossible to be both extensive and intensive. With a few exceptions, the Israel of Joels time was a narrow and exclusive body, hating and hated by other peoples. Behind the Law it kept itself strictly aloof. But without doing so, Israel could hardly have survived or prepared itself at that time for its influence on the world. Heathenism threatened it from all sides with the most insidious of infections; and there awaited it in the near future a still more subtle and powerful means of disintegration. In the wake of Alexanders expeditions, Hellenism poured across all the East; There was not a community nor a religion, save Israels, which was not Hellenised. That Israel remained Israel, in spite of Greek arms and the Greek mind, was due to the legalism of Ezra and Nehemiah, and to what we call the narrow enthusiasm of Joel. The hearts which kept their passion so confined felt all the deeper for its limits. They would be satisfied with nothing less than the inspiration of every Israelite, the fulfillment of the prayer of Moses: “Would to God that all Jehovahs people were prophets!” And of itself this carries Joels prediction to a wider fulfillment. A nation of prophets is meant for the world. But even the best of men do not see the full force of the truth God gives to them, nor follow it even to its immediate consequences. Few of the prophets did so, and at first none of the apostles. Joel does not hesitate to say that the heathen shall be destroyed. He does not think of Israels mission as foretold by the Second Isaiah; nor of “Malachis” vision of the heathen waiting upon Jehovah. But in the near future of Israel there was waiting another prophet to carry Joels doctrine to its full effect upon the world, to rescue the gospel of Gods grace from the narrowness of legalism and the awful pressure of Apocalypse, and by the parable of Jonah, the type of the prophet nation, to show to Israel that God had granted to the Gentiles also repentance unto life.
That it was the lurid clouds of Apocalypse which thus hemmed in our prophets view, is clear from the next verses. They bring the terrible manifestations of Gods wrath in nature very closely upon the lavish outpouring of the Spirit: “the sun turned to darkness and the moon to blood, the great and terrible Day of the Lord.” Apocalypse must always paralyze the missionary energies of religion. Who can think of converting the world when the world is about to be convulsed? There is only time for a remnant to be saved.
But when we get rid of Apocalypse, as the Book of Jonah does, then we have time and space opened up again, and the essential forces of such a prophecy of the Spirit as Joel has given us burst their national and temporary confines, and are seen to be applicable to all mankind.