Joel Chapter 3 - Pastor Van Jones

In one paragraph

Before the sermon proper, Felix stood up and told the congregation what his family has been through over the past year or so. His wife Guadalupe developed a debilitating neuropathy that left her unable to walk or sleep, and after four hospital visits without a diagnosis, months of suffering, and Felix losing his job when he took time off to care for her, the church covered the cost of her surgery....

Read together

1. Acts 3:1-10 read aloud at the opening of the service, the healing of the crippled man at the temple gate
2. Psalm 34:8 Felix quoted it as the song Taste and See while encouraging his wife Guadalupe in her suffering
3. Joel 2:13 rend your hearts not your garments, cited as the call to sincerity before God in the first half of Joel
4. Joel 2:28-29 the promise of the spirit poured out on all flesh, described as future for Joel but past for us, fulfilled at Pentecost
5. Joel 2:32 everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved, cited in connection with Pentecost and all nations
6. Joel 3:1 in those days I will restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, opening the judgment section of the sermon
7. Joel 3:9 proclaim this among the nations, beat your plowshares into swords, God calling the nations to judgment
8. Joel 3:13 swing the sickle for the harvest is ripe, the winepress is full, judgment on the nations
9. Joel 3:14 multitudes in the valley of decision, the moment of judgment
10. Joel 3:16 the Lord roars from Zion, the heavens and earth quake, but the Lord is a refuge to his people
11. Joel 3:17 so you shall know that I am the Lord your God who dwells in Zion
12. Joel 3:18 in that day the mountains shall drip sweet wine and the hills shall flow with milk, restoration
13. Joel 1:3 tell your children of it and let your children tell their children to another generation, used to close the sermon
14. Revelation 14:14 one like the son of man seated on a cloud with a golden crown and a sharp sickle, paralleling Joel's harvest judgment
15. Revelation 14:19 the angel swung his sickle and threw the grapes into the great winepress of God's wrath, blood flowing for 180 miles
16. Acts 2 Pentecost, Peter quoting Joel, seventeen nations hearing in their own languages, fulfillment of Joel 2:28
17. Isaiah 2 they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, cited as the reversal of Joel 3:9
18. John 7 briefly connected to the fountain coming forth from the house of the Lord in Joel 3:18, mentioned in relation to the Thursday men's lunch study

Talk about it

1. Felix said that when he first came to First Baptist he expected it to be like the churches he knew in Mexico, where there was obligation but no love. What was it that first showed him something was different here, and what does that say about what the church is actually for?
2. Felix described a long season of praying for Guadalupe and feeling like God was not listening or did not care, and then later saying, 'It is not when I want it, it is when he wants it.' Have you ever been in that kind of waiting, and how did it change you?
3. Van pointed out that in Joel chapter two the people repented at the last possible moment, with one foot in the world and one foot in God's camp, and he connected that to Jesus warning against being lukewarm. Where do you see that split allegiance showing up in your own life?
4. Van described the communion cup as a sign that Jesus took the full cup of God's wrath so we do not have to, and said the only thing separating us from being on the wrong side of that judgment is Christ. How does that change the way you think about taking communion together?
5. Van closed by quoting Joel chapter one, 'Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children and their children to another generation.' Felix also said he is trying to tell his sister and others in the Hispanic community what God has done. Who in your life needs to hear what God has done for you, and what is stopping you from telling them?