 Welcome to our service today. Our Sunday morning service is at 10 am. Join us in person or watch the live stream on our YouTube channel. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxBzxjBb3xU8ra2NHwvD_9A(the service can also be viewed at any time afterwards.)
The reading and reflection for the service can be found below:
Joel 2:12-13
12 Yet even now, says the LORD,
return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; 13 rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and relents from punishing. Joel 2:28-29: God’s Spirit Poured Out
28 Then afterwards,
I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. 29 Even on the male and female slaves, in those days, I will pour out my spirit. Reflection
A few months ago, I was on the beach, struggling to pull my small inflatable boat off the trailer. It has the 9.9 two-stroke Mercury on the back, which is actually more valuable than the boat itself. I know it has a slight leak from a snapper fin that poked into the boat the last time I caught a fish. But I’ve given it a good pump-up, and I know it’ll be fine for a few hours anyway.
As I struggle and grunt, a quarter-of-a-million-dollar amphibious Sealegs slowly rolls past me on the sand and drives straight into the ocean.
They have half a dozen beautiful rods and reels lined up along the back. There are muscled men with their shirts off, and attractive women on board, and they seem to be already drinking cold drinks from their little onboard refrigerator.
I pause and look, and I even do a little wave.
I’d like to say at this point that I measured my feelings against what Scripture teaches us. To remember, two common Hebrew words from Scripture : "iw-wî-ṯî-ḵā" and "ă-ša-ḥă-re-kā"—words that mean very similar things: longing, yearning, desiring, seeking.
So much of Scripture touches on those deep things.
But those words do not relate to my feelings about owning fishing rods like that, or a boat like that, or having a chest like that.
Why do you think the first commandment is:
“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods beside me?”
So, I pause, wave, and think things to myself. Probably the wrong things.
Scripture invites us to focus on the real meaning of these two words—about yearning and longing.
Isaiah 26:9 says it all:
"My soul yearns for you in the night; in the morning, my spirit longs for you."
Our scriptures have a profound interest in what we yearn for. What we long for. The prophets warned again and again that those yearnings and longings can lead to life and abundance - or frustration or even destruction.
This is where Joel’s prophetic voice speaks directly into our lives.
Prophets like Joel weren’t crystal-ball gazers. They were people filled with God’s Spirit, called to speak hard truths about the present.
Joel looked at the world around him—a world with stories of plagues, wars, and famine—and issued a warning: saying something like “If you carry on yearning or longing for the wrong things, destruction will follow.”
In Joel’s time, locust swarms devastated the land.
His vivid imagery captures both a literal plague and a metaphor for invading armies like the Assyrians and Babylonians. He says in chapter 1:
"What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten.
What the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten." This destruction wasn’t just about crops. It was about identity, faith, and survival.
Joel uses apocalyptic language—words that uncover and reveal deeper truths.
Today, we associate the word “apocalypse” with doom and disaster, but its original meaning is “to reveal.”
When Joel describes the locusts, he’s asking: What does this devastation reveal about our hearts? About our longings.
In our modern context, the “locusts” might be other things:
Joel’s answer to this is these three R’s: Return, Rend, Reward
"Yet even now," says the LORD, "return to me with all your heart."
Joel’s call to return isn’t about shame or guilt. It’s an invitation. No matter how far we’ve strayed, no matter what we’ve prioritised, God says: “Return to me.”
"Rend your hearts and not your clothing."
In Hebrew thought, the heart is not the seat of emotion but of will, courage, and determination. Joel isn’t asking for superficial displays of repentance, like tearing clothes in mourning. He’s asking for a deep, purposeful commitment to God.
"Then I will pour out my spirit on all flesh."
God’s promise is to fill us with His Spirit—a Spirit that binds up wounds, renews hearts, and inspires visions.
Joel’s message speaks to our modern challenges:
Joel’s answer is clear:
“Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.”
As I stood on that beach, watching the Sealegs glide toward the water, I realised something: The way we view the world shapes how we connect with others.
The expensive boat stops, and two blokes jump off, the come over and ask “Can I give you a hand.”
Something changes.
I thought back to those Hebrew words for longing and desiring. They have nothing to do with having a bigger boat or wanting more money.
They have everything to do with longing for human connection—for a relationship with God and one another. Basing our lives on a different set of priorities. A different vision.
On Tuesday we will be making a presentation at Kereru School in Papakura. A school whose teachers spend their day wrestling at the forefront of some of the most challenging social, economic and cultural challenges we face in our country.
It’s nice to give vouchers but it might be even better if those vouchers reflect our longing. Our longing to reach across distances, overcome barriers, confront inequality and injustice - those forces that separate and divide.
Paul in Corinthians tells us:
“All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.”
We live in times when there is quite a lot of troubling news. But I wonder if the unsettling feeling we have has not so much to do with fear or anxiety, but is much more to do with longing.
Joel reminds us that those longings can lead us in the wrong direction—or draw us closer to God and the other.
And that’s the promise we hear about today.
“I will pour out my spirit on all flesh;
your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
and your young men shall see visions.”
Today, the prophet Joel is asking: What do you long for? What do you worship? Who or what do you trust in times of change?
The good news is that God’s Spirit is already at work, drawing us back, renewing our hearts, and inspiring dreams and visions for the future.
Return to the Lord. Rend your heart. Receive the Spirit.
AMEN.
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