Joel 1 explained: A Locust Plague Strips the Land

Something never seen before (vv. 1-4)

Joel asks the oldest people whether anything this bad has ever happened, and says it must be retold for generations. The four names for locusts may be different kinds or stages of growth (scholars are unsure), but together they picture wave after wave eating whatever the last one left.

Wake up, wine drinkers (vv. 5-7)

Even people who usually drink through every crisis will notice, because the grapes are gone. The swarm is pictured as an invading army with lion's teeth, eating vines and stripping fig trees until the bare branches show white.

Grief for harvest and worship (vv. 8-12)

The land should mourn like a young woman whose fiancé has died; an engaged couple then counted as nearly married. With no grain or wine left, the daily offerings at the temple cannot be made, and farmers watch wheat, barley and every fruit tree fail.

A call to fast together (vv. 13-14)

Priests are told to wear sackcloth, rough cloth worn in grief, and stay up all night in mourning. Everyone is summoned to the temple for a day of fasting and stopping work, to cry out to the LORD together.

The day of the LORD (vv. 15-18)

"The day of the LORD" meant a coming time when God steps in to judge, and Joel sees this disaster as a sign it is near. The seeds shrivel, the barns stand empty, and even the cattle and sheep groan with hunger.

A prayer from scorched land (vv. 19-20)

Drought and fire have now finished what the locusts began, and Joel prays to the LORD. He pictures even the wild animals, panting by dry streambeds, as if they too were crying out to God.

Key verse: Joel 1:15

Where Christians differ

Christians differ over whether the locusts here are only a real insect plague or also stand for invading foreign armies, as many earlier readers took them.

Something to think about

Why do you think people so often look for meaning in a natural disaster, and what do you make of that impulse?