Have
you ever sat and asked yourselves why is the world the way it is? and I am not
talking here about the Higg’s particle or the laws of physics. The question I
am thinking about is this: why, as human beings, do we think the way we think,
why do we entertain certain ideas and not others? I do not believe that the
world of ideas is governed by biology it is governed by history. As individuals
what are the stories we tell ourselves to navigate life’s ups and downs. As
nations why do we structure our societies the way we do? These are difficult
questions and they are ones we naturally avoid.
To
sincerely ask these questions is to acknowledge that the answers we find may
require us to change. They may require us to turn around our whole way of
thinking. There is the danger here of conflicted thoughts, but also a danger of
personal change, transformation, and setting out on a different path. These
questions are in the territory, the realm, of the Prophets. Their calling is to
proclaim answers to these questions. Their calling is to propose a particular
view of the world that runs contrary to the widely accepted one. Their calling
is not based in this world’s values. It is rooted in an entire different ground.
It is a calling from an external source and something beyond their own creative
imagining. For they have been chosen by the almighty, sovereign, Creator God to
be a voice of one crying in the
wilderness:‘Prepare the way of the Lord’[1] (Mark
1:3).
In
listen to a prophet we are faced with the troubling possibility that there are
two alterative views of reality. On the one hand the dominant world view that
is so wide spread that it need not even be articulated, it is almost
universally accepted. And on the other hand we have this voice that is
irrelevant in world’s eyes, a cry from the ‘nowhere places of the world’, a
lone, guttural, wail that reality is rooted on a connection with the eternal
God.
You
see the role of the prophet is not primarily one of predicted the future or
even commenting on social justice. If you search the scriptures you will find
these aspects only form a small part of prophecy. If I may paraphrase Walter
Bruggerman[2]
here: the role of the prophet is to present “a contest between two different
descriptions of the world and an
effort to show that the God of the Bible version of reality is more adequate and finally more reliable than the
dominant cultural world view.
We
see this contest throughout scripture, from beginning to end. Remember Moses
presenting the people of God with a choice between two ways. Listen to voice of
Moses, (in Deut 30:19)
“19This
day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set
before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life”[3].
Listen
to Joshua’s declaration to the people of Israel (Joshua 24:15)
15And if it
seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you
will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other
side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as
for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”[4]
Remember
Elijah’s contest with the false prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. Listen to
Elijah (1 Kings 18:21)
Elijah went
before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If
the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”
Today,
in our nation, we do not have Baal as the dominant cultural world view. Our
dominant world view is founded on self-reliance and self-invention. We compete
with one another to achieve status and success, both material and social. There
is no default respect given for others. You often hear today “respect must be earned”. But if we
require this of others will they not require it of us? In our quite moments
when we are alone will we respect ourselves or will we be constantly anxious
about ‘who we are?’ So, as Bruggerman put it, we will be motivated by pervasive anxiety about having enough, or being enough, or
being in control[5]
Is this modern life, being continually stressed about who we are and what
we have? The Gospel say respect others and yourself, for this is the Golden
rule ‘Love your neighbor as yourself’[6]
The
dominant cultural world view is a consumerist, self-first, self-reliant, view
of life that is mixed together with a growing militant atheism. This atheism
arrogantly seeks to limit and reduce everything to what can be understood. It
is a belief system that is accountable to no-one. Its logical conclusions, as Nietzsche
advocated, is that power and arrogance are noble, i.e. “might is always right”
and look what both Hitler and Stalin did with this idea. This is in stark
contrast to the Gospel’s view of humble self-sacrifice, inter-personal
accountability and reliance, social transformation, justice and fairness for
all that is grounded in compassion, one for another.
The
biblical world view is one that starts with the assumption that God breathed
life into us and created all things. We are made with the breath of the eternal
God, in his likeness, living beings. However, we have forsaken this higher,
eternal, reality exchanging it for a self-reliance and self-invention myth. We
have abandoned, for the most part, the nature of God within us. The bible calls
this sin. This has consequences far beyond our individual freedoms and actions.
For once there is no longer any obligation for neighbour to look after
neighbour mankind is free to oppress and dispose neighbours of their rights. Is
this not the history of the world? Endlessly man fights against man, nation
wars against nation, with wretched nationalisms that sanction enslavement and theft
on a grand scale. The biblical account doesn’t end there, for it follows this
fall, this loss of humanity’s purpose, with God’s loving acts of revelation.
God
reaches out to us by lovingly revealing himself to a people, through a
historical journey over many generations. We stand here a part of that
historical family that stretches back to the being of humanity. So this
revelation of who God is continues even to this present day. This revelation of
the character and nature of God is given concrete form in the scriptures. And
these scripture can only be understood through the Spirit of God in the heart that
trusts.
Ultimately,
the story of the scriptures is one of redemption and love. Again and again, the Lord intervenes in
history to save his people. God is living and active. He miraculously frees the
Jewish people from slavery in Egypt through Moses. Then, again and again,
generation after generation God continues this revelation and redemptive love through
people like Joshua, Gideon, Samuel, Esther and Jehoshaphat. God saves his
people out of his compassion and love. These acts foreshadow the coming of
Saviour of the world; the Lord Jesus.
So
we turn to Joel, A prophet in the family of the people of God. A prophet’s call
is to say things that people will not want to hear! They generate sharp
opposition to their message. Amos was exiled, Jeremiah was thrown in a pit,
Elijah was sentenced to death and hunted and Isaiah was sawn in two! They are
called to live among scorpions and thorns[7] –
such is the opposition to what they say.
Because their call is to shine a light on the dangerous and terrible
spiritual conflict between ‘worldly-thinking’ and ‘God-thinking’. Joel’s task
was to highlight the conflict between the culturally accepted world view and
the Godly truth of creation, revelation and salvation. His call was to proclaim
the contest and like those before and after to say to the people ‘don’t sit on the fence you can’t choose both
life and death, choose life - choose God’
At
this point it is worth commenting a little on the literary style of the
prophetic writings. The first thing to say is that they share more similarity with
poetry than philosophy. They deal with this contest between God-thinking and
worldly-thinking by using story-pictures painted in words. It is interesting
that they don’t fight the ‘worldly-thinking’ with philosophy or reasoned
argument. You don’t fight fire with fire. Contrary to common wisdom, you fight
fire with water! i.e. something completely different. And the poetic prophetic
is able to touch hearts and souls in a way that philosophy or reasoned argument
cannot. So when you listen to the Prophets remember that this is not systematic
theology; it is not like Paul’s letters. They describe the things that have
been, that are, and still to be, from the vantage point of God’s perspective, in
a language that is poetically imprecise. They recognise that God cannot be
adequately described by reasoning and words alone.
In
Joel, chapter 1, we learned about the consequences of not trusting God’s plans
and purposes – disaster! You see the contest or battle between worldly-thinking
and God-thinking is not some polite philosophical debate – no. It is literally
a matter of life and death. For if selfishness and “each man for himself thinking” takes hold in a nation it results in
the destruction of communities. It brings suffering and sorrow in its wake.
Like an army of locusts devouring the land it brings despair and lays to waste
the lives of many. So Joel urges repentance, and a turning back to ways of God.
14Declare a
holy fast; call a sacred assembly.
Summon the
elders and all who live in the land
to the house
of the Lord your God, and cry out to the Lord.
In
chapter 2 he continues his proclamation with a call to return to God with all
of our hearts.
12“Even now,”
declares the Lord,
“return to me with all your heart,
with fasting and weeping and mourning.”
13 Rend your
heart and not your garments.
Return to the Lord your God,
for he is gracious and
compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in love,
and he relents from sending calamity.
And at the end of chapter 2 Joel gives us hope in that
future ‘day of the Lord’, that day of
blessing and compassion.
“ I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your old men will dream dreams,
your young men will see visions”.[8]
This verse was quoted by Peter at the first Pentecost
of the Church in acts 2. We as the new covenant people of God are to be a
prophetic people, young and old, male and female. We are to be dreamers of
dreams, people who image and envision our Lord God - a people who proclaim the
Good News about God.
This terrible and wonderful ‘day of the Lord’ is
prefigured in Acts 2. It is terrible because with it comes with the idea of
being personally called to account for our actions. It is wonderful because it
offers the hope of blessings beyond imagination. The ‘day of the Lord’ goes on
from Acts 2, literally stretching on from this event, through the full history
of the church, to the end of the world, at the end of chapter 2.
Chapter 3 continues this with a description of the
judgment of mankind. Listen to the prophet Joel, (Joel 3:2)
“I will
gather all nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat There I
will put them on trial for what they did to my inheritance, my people Israel”[9],
And in verse 14-16
Multitudes,
multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the
valley of decision. 15 The sun and moon will be darkened, and the
stars no longer shine. 16 The Lord will roar from Zion
What is the valley of Jehoshaphat, the valley of
decision? Here we see something of what poetry can do that logic cannot. Poetry
uses the history, our past and present experience to convey effects that are
difficult to articulate. It describes in a new, deeper way, the past events but
also portrays the present and future. The poetic prophetic often deals with all
three, past, present and future at the same time.
The ‘valley of
Jehoshaphat’ is literally in the Hebrew ‘the valley of Judgement’ for Jehoshaphat
means ‘God has judged’. Joel uses this poetic wordplay to describe an idea, not
just a specific place or event. Jehoshaphat, a former king of Judea, was surrounded
by enemies. This is described in 2 Chronicles 20:1-30. The people of Jerusalem
were in a desperate position: war with not one, or two but three strong enemies
at the same time! They, finally, call on the Lord for help, commit themselves
to God, worship, give thanks and march out to battle. But before even an arrow
was loosed by them, the enemy armies started to fight each other in a valley
near Jerusalem. They completely destroyed themselves – as Chronicles records; for
‘the battle belongs to the Lord … they
destroyed one another’. The judgement of the nations is rooted in decisions
they themselves make!
The problem with sin is not just that it offends the
Holy God. It offends the loving God because in living a ‘me-first’ existence we
can and do trample on others, whom God also loves. Warring and violence of individuals
and nations causes truly great and terrible suffering. Does God do nothing when
the cry of those who have suffered is heard by him in the valley of decision?
Does God say to them ‘so you have suffered, so what?’- No. God’s judgement is
primarily one of justice and fairness. There is a final recompense for those
who have suffered and been down-trodden, in the valley of decision and
Judgement. And this is the argument against the Atheist, for whom without God
there can never be any recompense, fairness or justice. You see we need God’s
judgements to balance the books, to set the scales of injustice and suffering
aright. Evil must not and shall not triumph. There will be many who look
forwards to receiving justice when they bring their tears and sorrows to God.
Joel paints the picture of judgement and justice for
the Jewish people. But this judgement is one that is set on an eternal stage and
cosmic scale, in the valley of decision. The whole of humanity are there. All
of the nations who contest with and against the Lord are there. ‘Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of
decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision’ . This
theme is picked another poetic-prophetic book, in Chapter 20 of revelation.
11Then I saw a
great white throne and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled
from his presence, and there was no place for them. 12And I saw the
dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened.
Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged
according to what they had done as recorded in the books. 13The sea
gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that
were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. 14Then
death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the
second death. 15Anyone whose name was not found written in the book
of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
‘Multitudes,
multitudes in the valley of decision’
– both the living and the dead. The judgement of God spans all people and all
times. There is no escaping from that time. And there is an unavoidable
decision to make. Which way are you going to go? Are you going to go into the valley
of decision trusting in your own strength and your own understanding? Are you
going to contend with the Lord God, in whom you do not trust or believe? Or is your
decision going to be ‘I want my name written in the book of life’. Do you enter
the valley like Jehoshaphat with repentance, and trust in Jesus Christ? Or are
you entering the valley like those armies with sword and shield, trusting in
your own strength, because you refuse to bow the knee, because you are determined
to be in charge of your own life.
The words of the Prophets to you, here and now, are
stop, stop, stop. Think what you are doing. Consider where your path is
leading. Turn back to your creator God, Trust Him; accept Jesus and his
sacrifice on the Cross. For if you trust Him you can have your slate wiped
clean. All the things you have done wrong can be forgiven – no matter how bad. Your
name will be written in the book of life. You may enter the valley of decision in
hope and expectation. I have set before
you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life
Choose life and the wonderful blessing of the heavenly
Jerusalem - Listen to the Apostle John
3And I heard a
loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the
people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself
will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from
their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the
old order of things has passed away.”
Amen
[1] Mark 1:3
[2] Brueggemann,
Walter (2011-12-15). The Practice of Prophetic Imagination: Preaching an
Emancipating Word (p. 2). Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition
[3] Deut
30:19
[4] Joshua
24:15
[5] Brueggemann,
Walter (2011-12-15). The Practice of Prophetic Imagination: Preaching an
Emancipating Word (p. 2). Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition
[6] Matthew
22:39
[7] Ezekiel
2
[8] Joel
2:28
[9] Joel 3:2
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