Blow the Trumpet in Zion: The Terrible Day Advances

The alarm now sounds from Zion. Joel describes an overwhelming host with the speed, order, noise, and terror of an army, while still using the imagery of the locust catastrophe. Eden-like land becomes wilderness behind it; earth and heavens tremble; sun, moon, and stars darken. The shock is that the LORD is not absent from the scene—he gives his voice before “his army.” Joel therefore refuses an easy division between natural disaster and divine judgment. The Day of the LORD is great and terrible, forcing the question the prophets repeatedly ask: who can endure it?