WATCHWORD MAY 2025

To you, Lord, I call, for fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness and flames have burned up all the trees of the field. Even the wild animals pant for you; the streams of water have dried up and fire has devoured the pastures in the wilderness.

Joel 1:19-20

We are met with a devastating and fear-inducing image with these lamenting words from the prophet Joel. These two verses form part of Joel’s closing prayer in which he pleads with God to rescue them from this land of destruction.

The prophet Joel was forced to utter this lamentation when an unparalleled devastation hit the land of Judah. Several swarms of locusts destroyed all seedlings, fields, fruit gardens, plants, and trees. This was accompanied by scorching heat drying up all water sources. The words ‘fire’ and ‘flame’ are used to express the consuming heat of the drought.

The utter ruin leads Joel to lament this judgement of God as well as to call together the people to repent. Even though we are not told what it is that the people must repent from, the first half of the chapter shows that the people indeed have turned away from God.

Sometimes we find passages like this in the Bible and struggle to make sense of them. What we can know when reading from the prophets is that they all shared a common goal: they were turning the people’s attention towards God and His coming Kingdom. Hence Verse 19 starts with the words: “To you, LORD, I call…….”. The people are being directed towards God. If they need help, it can and will only come from one source, and that is the almighty Himself.

May Joel’s words also direct our attention back to God, wherever we may be in life. For there is only One to whom we can call – be it for help, for forgiveness, for restoration, for joy, or for life. When everything seems dry, and all our surroundings thirst, there is only one source from which to drink, and as John Chapter 4 says, whoever drinks the water that Christ gives will never thirst. Indeed, the water He gives will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.

Pastor Ingrid van Sittert