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Sample map in the Joel Bible Atlas
Invaders are coming like a swarm of locusts
Thatโs Godโs message, as told by a prophet named Joel.
A few nibbling grasshoppers arenโt much of a problem. But in the Middle East, an angry swarm of hungry grasshoppers can explode up out of the desert sand and morph into a dark cloud big enough to blacken the sky and pose for photos shot from space.
The biggest swarms come from African and Arabian deserts where there arenโt many critters with an appetite for grasshoppers. When conditions are perfect for grasshoppers to propagate, swarms can soar a mile high before dropping onto a green and brown patch of grain, fruit, and vegetables.
In modern times, swarms have been measured at 80 million locusts per square kilometer.
They can wipe out grain fields, vineyards, and olive orchardsโalong with most every other plant eaten by people, livestock, and wild animals. When wild animals begin starving, livestock and people begin looking tastier.
No wonder locusts show up on the kosher menu of the Hebrew ancestors of todayโs Jewish people: โโฆlocusts, crickets, and grasshoppers. Eat any of them you likeโ (Leviticus 11:22).
Locusts, symbol for invaders
Joel used locusts to describe what invaders were going to do to the nation: Decimate it by stripping it bare to the bark. Thatโs a metaphor.
What locusts did to a farmerโs field, invaders would do to people, livestock, and cities in their path.
Joel warned that God was sending the invaders to punish the people for breaking their contract agreement to obey God in exchange for peace and prosperity.
โIf you donโt follow the law and you refuse to do what the LORD your God saysโฆYouโre going to have some painful experiences in your families, fields, flocks, and herdsโ (Deuteronomy 28:15-17).
โYou can do thisโ
Joelโs message in a paragraph:
โItโs not too late, the LORD says. Come back to me With all your heart, With fasting,ย crying, and sorrow.
Donโt tear your clothes in grief, though. Open your hearts instead. Go back to the LORD. Heโs your God. Heโs kind and full of mercy. โฆHis love wonโt quit. And the last thing he wants to do is punishโ (2:12-13).
They didnโt listen
The most common educated guess among Bible scholars is that the people didnโt do what Joel said. So, God did what he didnโt want to do.
A nation, possibly Judah, got wiped off the map.
As the Bible tells Judahโs story, invaders left no leaders and few survivors. Most who survived the battles were killed or deported to what is now Iraq.
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