DYNAMIS!
A publication of St. George Orthodox Christian Cathedral
Wichita, KS
Joel
2:12-26
(2/11-2/24)
A Reading at Sixth Hour on Wednesday of Forgiveness Week
Repentance and
Restoration: Joel 2:12-26 SAAS,
especially vs. 13: “...rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for He is
merciful and compassionate. He is
longsuffering and plenteous in mercy and repents of evils.” During
the years that the Lord Jesus ministered from
The significance of evil thoughts is twofold: 1) they work
corruption within us, and, of course, 2) sins result - often with terrible
consequences as a result of our wicked deeds. Above all, remember, among the most
important consequence that follows on our evil thoughts and actions: Divine
judgment can befall us. In the
present reading, through His Prophet Joel, the Lord invites us to heartfelt
repentance, promising to “...restore to [us] the years the grasshopper
and the locust have eaten, and for the blight, and the
caterpillar...” (Joel 2:25).
We pay a heavy price for evil thoughts and passions. Like worms, they infest our hearts and
souls. Saint Gregory of Nyssa
describes this degradation well: “...Man, who once lived in the delights
of Paradise, has been transplanted into this unhealthy and wearisome place,
where his life, once accustomed to impassibility, became instead subject to
passion and corruption...[For once any innate passion] occupies the castle of
the soul like a tyrant [it] afflicts the obedient lord through his own
subjects...For the whole array of passions, wrath and fear, cowardice and
impudence, depression as well as pleasure, hatred, strife and merciless
cruelty, envy as well as flattery, brutality together with brooding over
injuries, they are all so many despotic masters....” These inner masters are what Joel termed
“...the army from the north...(vs. 20) who makes
desolate and reproaches the Name we bear.
The promised land within us is despoiled!
But, our Lord calls us to repent: “Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting and wailing and with
mourning; rend your heart and not your garments” (vss. 12, 13). Thus the Prophet holds up the icon of
saving repentance and encourages us.
Let the Priests sound the trumpet, God’s people gather, and even
newly-weds set aside their nuptial joys.
Let God’s People weep for their sins before the Altar. Lent is coming. Cry to God for release from sin
“...spare Your people, do not give Your
inheritance to reproach, that the Gentiles should rule over them” (vss.
15-17).
God declares that He will turn His “...face away from
[our] sins and blot out all [our] iniquities ”
(Ps. 50:9). He desires not the
death of sinners but that we repent and live. He describes Himself as
“...merciful and compassionate...longsuffering and plenteous in
mercy...” (Joel 2:13). Thus,
the Lord invites us to embrace the coming Great Fast. “Be of good
courage...rejoice and be glad, for the Lord has done great things” (vs.
21). Then, as Joel assures
us, God will “...shower [us] as before with the early and the late
rain” (vs. 23). He
“will restore to [us] the years” eaten up by the consequences of
our sins (vs. 25). Metropolitan Hierotheos Vlachos teaches us that “Repentance in
deep mourning and joined with confession is what unveils the eyes of the soul
to see the great things of God.”
Repentance is the promise of Great Lent, if pursued diligently, and
shall enable us to “...praise the name of the Lord your God for what He
has so wondrously done unto you” (vs. 26). Now is the time to work at our healing.
Grant, O Lord,
that we may complete the remaining time of our life in repentance.
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