A light in the darkness

What the locust swarm has left the great locusts have eaten; what the great locusts have left, the young locusts have eaten; what the young locusts have left other locusts have eaten (Joel 1:4)
I love the way the translators ran out of different words for kinds of locust and fell back on the rather feeble 'other locusts'. In truth, no one knows what any of the words used here for locusts mean. The key purpose is to show the progressive affects of the destruction. What was left over by one was eaten by the next. It is a slamming of door after door, as each brief candle of hope is snuffed out by the next wind of destruction.
It certainly rings a loud bell now. Our hope for containment in Wuhan was quickly dashed. Our expectation that it might not be as serious as first thought blown away by the news from the hospitals in northern Italy. Our vague sense that the channel might again be a barrier to invasion quashed. And now as each day succeeds each day, we are put into deeper and deeper restrictions. Schools close, trains run rarely, jobs disappear, work dries up, families are split, relatives die and we cannot attend their funeral, let alone say goodbye.
What hope is left? Well, without wishing to ruin the plot, Joel is the great book of hope. In the midst of disaster, Joel sees far ahead to what God is doing in their midst and how God will do far greater things later. Joel knows, deep in his 'knower', that the God he worships is not one who is shut down by despair. It is in the darkest night that the light shines the brightest. So can we wait on God in the quiet of the night, in the depths of darkness? If we cannot, then we are left only to await the next wave of locusts with dread. But if we can, then we may yet see God do a new thing, just as Joel did. In our hearts, for sure. In our nation? Well, that's up to God, but it is a hope worth holding on to.

Comments

  1. Simon Martin20 March 2020 at 11:16

    I'm really enjoying these blog posts George. Powerful stuff!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. George Moody20 March 2020 at 11:24

      Thanks for the encouragement. For a lot of people this is a really hard time, so anything that helps is great.

      Delete
    2. Unknown20 March 2020 at 20:55

      This is great stuff George. Some of us at Christ Church have been spending time in Joel since September, and it suddenly has the most enormous resonance. Even lack of supplies, and worship being affected- so many things

      Grateful for these posts. Lucy Ffrench

      Delete

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