The Pulpit Commentary — Joel — Section 58

solemnity Bnd grBnrlcnr Rh&Jl u1ber in the day of vengeance on the wicked sinners of every clase, Cl!Jlecially Huch RB persecute and oppreBB the people of God. I. TnE PnovrnENOK OF Gon AT wo11x. Men propose, God disposes; they pursue thilir own individual ple.n11, and yet all the while they are only carrying out the Divine pUl'JlOBes, A remarkable examll1e of the wonderful echeme of God's providence is recorded in the fourth chapter of the Act&, when earthly kings and rulers were gatherer! ngninst the Lord and hie Anointed. "Of a truth," it is added," against thy holy Child Jesus, whom thou haatanointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together; " but in all they planned and purposed and performed, though following their own impulses, they only did" wbataoever thy band and thy counsel determined before to he done." 80 in the case before us, the Gentiles are assembling in great force and strenuously pushing forward their hostile movements against the people of God; and yet they, withont thinking it and without intending it, are accomplishing the Divine purposes against themselves. They are hastening on their own destruction, and rushmg on their own ruin. II. THE PREPARATION MADE. The preparation ill heralded among the Gentiles by a formal and fearful proclamation. The warlike preparations are on the grandest scale ; they mean the work of war in earnest. Not only mighty men and men of war are sum- moned to the strife ; but, besides the men whose trade ls war, husbandmen are called away from their peaceful occupations, their implements of husbandry are changed into weapons of war. Even the weak are for the time to gird themselves with strength. What is the object, one naturally asks, of all this immense 888emblage,of their activity and energy and vast preparations? Every one in that huge multitude thinks his mission is to destroy the people and Church of the Most High, and imagines himself commissioned for that purpose; nor do those mighty masses dream that their own doom is sealed, and that they are convened, not for the annihilation of the people of God, but for their own. They are convoked to appear before the august tribunal of the righteous Ruler of'tbe universe to receive their sentence-a sentence in agreement with unerring justice, and to be executed in accordance therewith. The executioners are already on the spot ; they are agents appointed and armed for the expreee purpose. It matters not whe~her they are angels or men; perhaps the enemies themselves, engaging in internecine strife, as was the case with the confederates that once came to tight against Jeboehapl;lat, then turned their arms against each other. III. PREVENTION OF BIB PEOPLE'S· FEABB. God repeats the BUDlmons to his enemie.s to assemble themselves for judgment. 1. This he does to pel'l!uade his own people that their fears are gronndleee, and to prevent them apprehending peril from the power and preparations of their enemies. To prevent them being troubled by the might and multitude of their enemies, he repeats his challenge, if l may so term it, for tbem to come on, one and all, with all their powers. Thus be means to show how puny and insignificant all those enemies were in his eight, and let bis people know that his hand is in the whole business, overruling all and controlling all. 2. But he makes it evident that all his proceedings are in righteousness, that justice and judgment are the habitation of hie throne. He pleads before he punishes; he sifts the case judicially before he passes sentence. He Bits to judge, taking sufficient time and pains, so that he is juBtified when he speaks, and clear when he judges. IV. PERIOD OF EXECUTION, Once judgment is pronounced and sentence passed, the execution is not long delayed. The ripeness of the harvest now ready for reapi~g, the fulneee of the presses now lit for treading, and the overflow of the vats now wa1trng for the foot of the trampler, are :figures eal!i.ly understood, and of which the corn,- sponding fact is the greatnes11 of the wickedness. Harvest is used in a good sense, oftener in e. bad sense; whila the treading of the wine-press is always expressive of Divine wrath. The ripeness of the one and the fulneee of the other imply not only the height of abounding ungodliness, but the.t the fulness of the time for punishment has arrived, as in the ce.ee of the old world, when e.11 flesh had corrupted hie way upon the earth, so that God said, "The end of all flesh is before me ; " or as Sodom, when lire and brimstone were rained from heaven on its wicked inhabitants; or as when our Lord said," Fill ye up the measure of your fatb81'11. "They," says Poeocke, "were ripe in their sine, fit for a harvest, and as full of wickedness as ri~ grapes, which fill and overflow the vats, through t-he abundance of the j11ice with waich they swell!' fi8 THE BOOK OF JOEL, [on. m. 1-21,