The Prophets are Calling

Today is the Wednesday of Cheesefare, and that means something in the Church. It means first of all, that we have begun to fast from meat, and are standing (or kneeling as the case might be) on the threshold of the Great Fast. Today is ‘lenten’ in character as it pertains to the services of the Church. We’re getting closer to the Great Fast, and in the readings for today we hear an interesting thing.

As I’ve said in previous posts, during the Great Fast we do not read from the New Testament during the weekdays. Instead we read from the Old Testament, by reading Genesis, Isaiah, and Proverbs. This all begins next week with the Great Fast. Today, however the Church brings us the call of another Prophet, the Prophet Joel.

“Yet even now,” says the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; and rend your hearts and not your garments.” Return to the Lord, your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and repents of evil. Who knows whether he will not turn and repent, and leave a blessing behind him, a cereal offering and a drink offering for the Lord, your God? Blow the trumpet in Zion; sanctify a fast; call a solemn assembly; gather the people. Sanctify the congregation; assemble the elders; gather the children, even nursing infants. Let the bridegroom leave his room, and the bride her chamber. Between the vestibule and the altar let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep and say, “Spare thy people, O Lord, and make not thy heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?'” Then the Lord became jealous for his land, and had pity on his people. The Lord answered and said to his people, “Behold, I am sending to you grain, wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied; and I will no more make you a reproach among the nations. “I will remove the northerner far from you, and drive him into a parched and desolate land, his front into the eastern sea, and his rear into the western sea; the stench and foul smell of him will rise, for he has done great things. “Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done great things! Fear not, you beasts of the field, for the pastures of the wilderness are green; the tree bears its fruit, the fig tree and vine give their full yield. “Be glad, O sons of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord, your God; for he has given the early rain for your vindication, he has poured down for you abundant rain, the early and the latter rain, as before. “The threshing floors shall be full of grain, the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. I will restore to you the years which the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army, which I sent among you. “You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, who has dealt wondrously with you. And my people shall never again be put to shame.” Joel 2.12-26

Let the nations bestir themselves, and come up to the valley of Jehosh’aphat; for there I will sit to judge all the nations round about. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Go in, tread, for the wine press is full. The vats overflow, for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes, in the valley of decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. And the Lord roars from Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem, and the heavens and the earth shake. But the Lord is a refuge to his people, a stronghold to the people of Israel. “So you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who dwell in Zion, my holy mountain. And Jerusalem shall be holy and strangers shall never again pass through it. “And in that day the mountains shall drip sweet wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the stream beds of Judah shall flow with water; and a fountain shall come forth from the house of the Lord and water the valley of Shittim. “Egypt shall become a desolation and Edom a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the people of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. But Judah shall be inhabited for ever, and Jerusalem to all generations. I will avenge their blood, and I will not clear the guilty, for the Lord dwells in Zion.” Joel 3.12-21

The urgent call of the Prophet is a call to us, even though we live thousands of years later. He lived more than 750 years BEFORE CHRIST, so how can he be calling us? We are also called to repentance, and fasting, and urged to return to God. Throughout Church history, it was common to associate fasting with a pious process of begging God for forgiveness and assistance, and nobody can deny we need His forgiveness and assistance now in our world.

The Prophet calls us to fast and weep and rend our hearts instead of our garments. Our hearts have grown cold to God and to our fellow human beings. Nation waring against nation is just the most recent public outcry, but there are other acts of hatred in our world. Millions of unborn children are murdered in their mothers’ womb, millions of poverty-stricken citizens are left on the streets to starve, hundred of millions are under the thumb of oppression and slavery. Yep…..the world definitely could use a good fast.

Each of us has a role to play in the condition of our world, whether it be directly in the way we treat others in our personal interactions, or how we consume products and resources without a care for the person providing them to us. We vote for politicians that care about their own pockets rather than the people they serve, and we sit in judgment the turmoil in the world. We are part of the problem, at least we should understand our role in the problem.

That is why the Church calls each of us to repentance and fasting in the coming weeks. We fast to change our hearts. We fast to learn self-control. We fast to offer God our bodies as an offering. Today, the Church glances ahead to the Great Fast and calls us through the Prophet. Will we listen?