Joel 1

The People Mourn the Destruction of the Crops

1This is the Lord’s message to Joel son of Pethuel.

²Pay attention, you older people;

everyone in Judah, listen.

Has anything like this ever happened

in your time or the time of your ancestors?

³Tell your children about it;

they will tell their children,

who in turn will tell the next generation.

⁴Swarm after swarm of locusts settled on the crops;

what one swarm left, the next swarm devoured.

⁵Wake up and weep, you drunkards;

cry, you wine drinkers;

the grapes for making new wine have been destroyed.

^6*An army of locusts has attacked our land;

they are powerful and too many to count;

their teeth are as sharp as those of a lion.

⁷They have destroyed our grapevines

and chewed up our fig trees.

They have stripped off the bark,

till the branches are white.

⁸Cry, you people, like a young woman who mourns the death

of the man she was going to marry.

⁹There is no corn or wine to offer in the Temple;

the priests mourn because they have no offerings for the Lord.

¹⁰The fields are bare;

the ground mourns

because the corn is destroyed,

the grapes are dried up, and the olive trees are withered.

¹¹Grieve, you farmers;

cry, you that take care of the vineyards,

because the wheat, the barley,

yes, all the crops are destroyed.

¹²The grapevines and fig trees have withered;

all the fruit trees have wilted and died.

The joy of the people is gone.

¹³Put on sackcloth and weep,

you priests who serve at the altar!

Go into the Temple and mourn all night!

There is no corn or wine to offer your God.

¹⁴Give orders for a fast;

call an assembly!

Gather the leaders

and all the people of Judah

into the Temple of the Lord your God

and cry out to him.

^15*The day of the Lord is near;

the day when the Almighty brings destruction.

What terror that day will bring!

¹⁶We look on helpless as our crops are destroyed.

There is no joy in the Temple of our God.

¹⁷The seeds die in the dry earth.

There is no grain to be stored,

and so the empty granaries are in ruins.

¹⁸The cattle are bellowing in distress

because there is no pasture for them;

the flocks of sheep also suffer.

¹⁹I cry out to you, Lord,

because the pastures and trees are dried up,

as though a fire had burnt them.

²⁰Even the wild animals cry out to you

because the streams have become dry.