Joel 2:12-13; 28-29 (Acts 2:1-4; 14-16)
We continue our journey towards
Bethlehem this week, hearing again the ancient voices of the prophets as they
pointed to something new that God would do as a part of redeeming the broken
world in which we live. Hear today the words the prophet Joel spoke to the
people almost 3000 years ago as Jerusalem and the surrounding areas are facing
possible starvation. A plague of locusts has stripped the land bare. The people
do not even have enough grain to make the bread for the Temple offering. Farmers
have no harvest, and everyone has just the grain remaining from the last
harvest.
Plagues and starvation—these are
so far outside our own experience. Right? Or are they…?
Plagues—are
unpredictable. The locust swarms in Joel’s time came when they came with no
warning. Plagues usually come this way. Unlike the predictable rainy and dry
seasons, the locust swarms happened when the happened, and when the happened,
the results were devastating—potential starvation.
We know something of plagues—the
bubonic plague—The Black Death— that killed around 35 million people in Eurasia
and North Africa in the 14th Century, the so-called “Spanish Flu” of
the early 20th Century that killed over 50 million, and “COVID-19”
of the early 21st Century that killed over seven million. So,
plagues—those unexpected, unpredictable disasters that happen upon our
lives—these, we do know.
Starvation—From the
number of pictures of food I see on social media, I’d say not too many folks
are starving. The CDC reports that our national obesity rate is around 40%...so
not too many of us in the US are starving. But, this last month, our food
pantry here at McAllen First UMC served over 165 families. According to our
regional food bank, almost 150,000 people in the RGV face “food insecurity.”
Maybe physical starvation is a thing….
Emotional and spiritual
starvation have become epidemic in the world here at the beginning of the 21st
Century. We now know that our amazing smartphones with their unbelievable apps
that connect us to thousands, even millions, of people around the world are
leaving us emotionally starved. Some strive to address this emotional
starvation with food, some with shopping, and still others with another app.
In the 17th Century,
French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal writes Pensées:
“What else does this craving, and
this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in [us] a true happiness,
of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace?
This [we] try in vain to fill
with everything around [us], …though none can help, since this infinite abyss
can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object; in other words by God
himself.”[1]
In other words, “There is a
God-shaped hole in the heart of each of us which cannot be satisfied by any
created thing but only by God.”
Our spiritual starvation is as
real as an empty stomach, and we try to fill it with food, with new gadgets,
with new clothes, with new experiences, with social media, with “everything
around us.”
Conclusions—The
people of Jerusalem and the surrounding areas craved protection, safety, and
security from the plagues of their world. And, once the plague hit, the
hungered for the grains, fruits, and vegetables that would quell the emptiness
of their stomachs.
We crave to be protected, to be
safe, to be secure from the plagues of this world. We hunger to be full, to be
satiated.
Joel proclaims that these things
will come. God will give to the people, to us, the very thing we need. We will
live securely in the assurance of life unending. Our spiritual hunger will be
satiated as God pours himself into us through His Spirit. True security, true
satiety comes to us through Bethlehem. Today, we can turn to God for security, today
we can allow God to begin filling the emptiness of our lives. Oh, the gift that
God gives us all in Bethlehem….
Sunday, December 8, 2024
“Towards Bethlehem—Joel”
Watch/Listen: HERE
[1]
“The Correct Quote of Blaise Pascal.” It’s Just Me: SARAH. Last modified
October 14, 2011. https://itsjustme.wordpress.com/2011/04/19/the-correct-quote-of-blaise-pascal/.
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