Joel 2:32 speaks about ‘the survivors’, the same word as in Isaiah 1:9. The verse is quoted by Peter in Acts 2:39, and in verse 40 we still hear echoes from it. What is this ‘remnant’ in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem and what is its application?
‘Be saved’ is a more accurate translation of the verb in Acts 2:40, presuming that Luke deliberately used a passive voice rather than a middle voice (‘save yourselves’). But what it implies in koine Greek and how this form is used in other instances, we will have to further investigate. This is the only instance in the New Testament. A passive imperative sounds a bit odd, but in the case of the verb ‘to save’ the passive and middle voice forms are different and here Luke has chosen the passive voice. Maybe it is grammatically comparable with ‘be filled’ in Eph. 5:18, but the verb ‘to fill’ does not have a passive form that is distinctive from the middle voice and here it is in the present tense. ‘Be saved’ is in the aorist tense. Anyway, Peter seems to exhort the people to be saved. But we have to consider the context. He says, ‘Be saved from …’ Now we would expect him to say something like ‘the wrath of God’, ‘God’s judgement’ or ‘eternal condemnation’, but instead he says, ‘… from this crooked generation.’ By this he either means to be saved from its direct bad influence and wickedness or from its inevitable lot of God’s condemnation. To me the best option seems to be the former. In that case the exhortation is to see how we should change our lives, our customs, our behaviour, our associates in such a way that the unbelieving community cannot draw us away from our devotion to God. Here ‘salvation’ could imply protection, rather than the promise of eternal life. Apparently we need God’s help to do so. So ‘withdraw yourselves, with God’s help, from the wickedness of this world.’ We are in the world, but not of it. We ‘abide in Christ’. ‘Be saved’ could also have a soothing and comforting implication: be saved from its tyranny, cruelty and injustice, its suppression and its corruption, everything that makes victims and causes suffering, abuse of power and position.
These devout Jews and proselytes in Acts 2 were witnessing a different kind of worship. It was worship under the direct authority and guidance of the Holy Spirit. There was no temple service involved, no high priest or other priests or Levites. Here was a fresh start of a new community of the people of God in the midst of a society that claimed to be the people of God but was in fact utterly corrupt. So the first hearers may have heard the exhortation to ‘be saved from this crooked generation’ as to make a fresh start as people of God, the direct authority of the Holy Spirit being the exclusive way of true worship instead of temple service. They must have known its grip on society and how it served as an excuse for power, comparable with pope Leo X’s project of building the St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. The Kingdom of God is the only answer to corrupt society, including religion.
The idea in Joel is that if God would indeed pour out His Spirit on all flesh prophetic ministry as a call to God’s people to return to God would no longer be necessary or even wanted. ‘To prophecy’ would get a different meaning, a much more positive purpose. Jeremiah’s prophecy was to break down and to build, to plant and to pluck up. The prophet’s message under the New Covenant was to be more on the planting and building side.

At first sight Salvation in Joel is mainly about escaping the wrath of God. This is, indeed, the gospel. In the gospel God Himself is the centre of attention and direction. ‘God so loved the world …’ In the gospel God does not say to humanity, ‘Please, repent’, but ‘Repent!’ Likewise, in Joel the Lord urges the people of Judea to return to Him. When Jesus is sent into the world to proclaim the Kingdom of God we are confronted with a kind of dualism of evil. There are wicked people, but there are also crowds of victims of evil. Wrath and mercy go hand in hand. That is probably the reason why God is asking the prophet to proclaim to the nations to consecrate for war in the Valley of Decision. There it will become clear who is on the Lord’s side and who is not. Apart from the fact that this is describing a future event the prophecy expresses the ardent hope and the urgent necessity for the establishment of the righteous reign of the Kingdom of God. This picture of God’s final judgement is more than the fulfilment of a long awaited vindication; it is part of the call to repentance. The promises are given to help return to the Lord now. They emphasise the urgency.

One of the major themes in Joel is the Day of the LORD. It appears in all sections:
1. judgement of Zion
1.1 the locusts – 1:15
1.2 the army – 2:1-2, 11
2. the promise of the Spirit – 2:31
3. judgement of the nations and restoration of Zion – 3:14, 18.
From this observation we may ask ourselves if the Day of the LORD refers to three different events. From a historical perspective it does, but from a prophetical perspective it does not. And the latter is our concern. We will find application in the prophetical perspective only. Of course we can lay down the three aspects of the Day of the LORD historically, namely the destruction of the kingdom of Judea/Benjamin by the Chaldeans, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost and the establishment of the eternal Kingdom of God. But if we concentrate on each aspect in stead of seeing it as a whole we may miss the point. Maybe that is why the only thing we get to know about the prophet himself is that he is the son of Pethuel, so we may have to find some significance in the meaning of that name, which is Vision of God, or Enlargement, Opening up. We may say that God is opening up His heart. He must judge on the basis of His covenant, but that is not His final word. His judgement is inextricably bound up with His love and His purpose of dwelling with mankind. For that reason 2:13 is the heart of the book: God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. His judgement is loving discipline at the same time and even bound up with the promise of vindication. And that is all laid down in His covenant. So first of all we have to look at Joel as a typical prophet, whose task it is to lead God’s people on to the right track towards the fulfilment of His promises.

When we bring the book of Joel to mind we first think of the locust plague and then the promise of the Spirit. Had Peter not quoted Joel we might have forgotten the contents altogether. Indeed, the promise of the Spirit is both central and remarkable. Even more central though, is the house of God. Once we focus on the latter theme, we find that the former serves the latter.
Expositors of Joel easily get frustrated because of the absence of background information. The Holy Spirit must have intended to leave out historical facts, so that the reader is helped to look elsewhere for the prophet’s significance and relevance. What is evident is that there is a paradigm shift, a transition from one world to another, one era to another era.
In the first era we find the priests, the ministers of the altar, the ministers of God. ‘My God’, says Joel (1:13), ‘the LORD your God’ (1:14, 2:13), ‘the house of our God’ (1:16). But then in 2:17 the priests are called the ministers of the LORD. They are exhorted to weep and say, ‘Spare your people, O LORD, and make not your heritage a reproach, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, “Where is their God?”’ Once the priests realize that Israel’s call is to be God’s heritage among the nations and that the LORD’s own reputation is at stake, things change.
Here we find a first hint to the significance of Joel for our own time. We hear the prophet speak, of course, from a different perspective. In his time the Spirit had not yet come. We now know that the promise of the Spirit has been fulfilled. But the underlying message remains the same. It is the message that it is essential for God’s people to realize that they are here for God’s sake and not for themselves. Yes, ‘if God be for us …’ that is true, but even the context of that phrase points to God’s ultimate purpose, to have a heritage for Himself, consisting of both Jews and gentiles glorifying Him together with one voice (Romans 15:5-6). This is key to understand the book of Joel. That there is scarcity of food because of God’s judgement is, of course, terrible. There is no joy in the land. Everybody is hungry. But to describe the seriousness of the situation and the severity of judgement Joel does not dwell on hunger, but on the fact that the priests do not have a grain offering or a drink offering. It is about worship.
In the second era we still find the house of the LORD (3:18), but now the Spirit has been poured out on all flesh. No human mediation between God and man is needed anymore. This is what can be called Kingdom reality. Joel speaks about salvation, which is twofold. It is salvation from destruction on the Day of the LORD and it is salvation unto mount Zion, the house of the LORD, the place where He is served, i.e. worshipped. ‘You shall eat in plenty’, is the promise after God has granted restoration, ‘… and praise the name of the LORD your God.’

To live out our heavenly citizenship is to be brought down to earth and do all things without grumbling or disputing. Paul refers to citizenship twice in this letter, in 1:27 – as a verb, to be a citizen – and in 3:20. Especially from 3:20, ‘our citizenship is in heaven’, we understand this comprises our pilgrim status as Christians. ‘This world is not my home, I’m just a passin’ through’, sings Jim Reeves. But that is not what Paul means. What he means by heavenly citizenship is a status indeed, but as representing the highest authority in heaven, Christ, here on earth. Jesus is Lord. He has the name above all names. And the world needs to know that. The world needs to see the reality of it. So if we keep on grumbling and disputing, the world will not believe.
Two elements add to our living out our heavenly citizenship, joy and fearlessness, amidst opposition. Indeed, just passin’ through until we shake mother’s hand at heaven’s open door is a bit of a distorted picture of the Christian life. The Church is to proclaim here and now the Lordship of Jesus Christ in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. Conflict (1:30) is inevitable. But to live is Christ, says Paul, to die is gain. What seems to be failure and defeat will turn out to be victory. The fellowship of Christ’s sufferings entails the fellowship of His resurrection power and will ultimately mean the resurrection in glory. Christ’s resurrection is a fait accompli. He reigns. He reigns with a power with which He can subject all things, even death.
Paul’s message probably lies somewhere in between pre-millennialism pessimism and post-millennialism optimism (he does not belong to either camp). His concern is the gospel and that is why his concern is the quality of spiritual life in the Church as well. A good presentation of the gospel will cause the Church to want to gain Christ at any cost. That will make the Church fearless in the midst of opposition, which will in turn advance the spreading of the gospel – a nuclear reaction. Paul may be bound with chains, the Word of God is not bound (2 Tim. 2:9); on the contrary. Paul is a realist. In Thessalonica the believers are accused of turning the world upside down; in Athens the harvest is only a handful of converts. The gospel spreads like wildfire, but a lot of shaking off of the dust on disciples’ feet must be done as well. The Kingdom of God is real. Jesus is on the throne. Paul’s urge is to live accordingly.