Joel

[0:00] I would attempt this evening, as the Lord may be pleased to help, to speak from a word found in the prophecy of Joel, the second chapter, and words that are found in the 15th verse, 15th verse of the second chapter of the prophecy of Joel.

[0:35] Blow the trumpet in silence, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly.

[0:47] Joel, the second chapter, and verse 15. These words were given to the Lord's servant Joel at a time of great national trouble, and also in a time when God's church and his people were in considerable danger.

[1:20] And the Lord gives to his servant this commandment that consists of three important things.

[1:42] First of all, there was the commandment to blow the trumpet in Zion. Secondly, there was a command to sanctify a fast.

[2:00] And thirdly, there was this command to call the solemn assembly. And we shall try to open up these three important things, and I hope we shall see how relative they are to our present condition and the straits in which we are placed.

[2:29] And this may be somewhat different line from my usual line, but it's very important in my view, and I feel it laid upon my mind thus to speak to you tonight.

[2:45] You see, God, when he was ordering and commanding his ancient people, bringing them out of Egypt, leading them through that tremendous journey of 40 years, and eventually bringing them into the promised land, he provided some certain very important things for their direction, for their safety, and for their guidance and their command.

[3:33] And among those things, there was the trumpet. And I wanted you to notice in our reading the precise and detailed provision the Lord made for the structure and the use of those trumpets.

[3:56] They were to be silver. That is a significant feature. They were to represent the atonement. Silver always represented the atonement to the minds of the children of Israel in the wilderness.

[4:21] God had declared that silver would be and was to be a symbol of his atoning love and his goodness.

[4:34] And the trumpets were to be made of pure silver. And they were to be made, no doubt you noticed this in the reading, they were to be made of one whole piece.

[4:50] They were not to be molded together or fitted together in parts. They were to be a complete unit.

[5:01] And doubtless the reason for that was this, that they should give a clear and a perfect sound.

[5:12] And as we read that chapter, we saw how much God placed in the way of importance upon the use of those trumpets.

[5:27] How much notice the children of Israel were to take of those trumpets and the sounding of them. They could not move without them.

[5:41] There was a warning in the trumpet. There was an alarm as we read it. And every time there was an assembly needed to gather the children of Israel together, the trumpets sounded.

[6:00] And when indeed there were enemies that appeared on one side or another to attack the whole of the tribes of the children of Israel, the trumpet was to sound an alarm.

[6:21] And God saw to it, he saw to it by the very structure of the trumpets, and by the number of the trumpets, and by the sounding of the trumpets, that his people should be rightly warned when any and every kind of danger presented itself to them.

[6:46] Then again, you notice also in our reading, how that when those moments of acceptance by God of the sacrifices of his people, like the sin offering and the peace offering, the trumpets were to be sounded then, a trumpet of joy, a joyful sound.

[7:21] And the psalmist says in the 68th Psalm, in the 89th Psalm, he says, Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound.

[7:34] They shall walk, O Lord, in the light of the living. And then, furthermore, when God had prescribed laws for his people, and that wonderfully wise and gracious law that he prescribed for his children, which brought liberty to the slave, and great rejoicing to the whole of the children of Israel, the announcement of that day or year of liberty was to be by the trumpets.

[8:22] These same trumpets that God had ordained and ordered to be made were therefore with a manifold usage in and among the tribes of Israel.

[8:37] And I can see in this how, what a line of things, of course, and direction to the children of God all the way down the ages of time.

[8:51] And I would venture to say this, that where there is lacking or in any way ill use or no use of the trumpets, then God's people are in a pitiful condition.

[9:13] They're in a weak state, they're in danger, they're a subject and liable to be attacked by their enemies and are in a sad and sorrowful state and condition.

[9:29] Then again, in the prophecy of Isaiah, that great promise of God that he made to his servant was this, that there shall be a trumpet sounded and that sound should go out to the very ends of the earth and the sound of that to all who heard it would bring in the outcasts, bring in those that were far off, desperate and dejective and they should be brought in to sit down in the kingdom of God.

[10:14] Now, there again we have a glorious representation of the trumpet of the gospel. My friends, I have, I speak generally now, one of the great evils of our present time have been a total lacking of the trumpet sound.

[10:39] Except just here and there, there has been scarcely no sound of the trumpet. The gospel has been relegated to a position of inferiority.

[10:57] Great truths of God, the glorious doctrines of Christ and his salvation and his redemption have been grossly ignored and almost in some areas totally dismissed.

[11:18] And what can we expect? If in the days of those dear children of Israel as they were coming through the wilderness, if there had been not a cessation of the use of the trumpet, then they would have been consumed by their enemies.

[11:40] You remember in our reading what God said about the trumpet? He said, when it is sounded, you will hear, yes, but far more important than that, I will hear.

[11:53] I will hear, he says, and I will save you. Now, dear friends, let us try and put these things in our own, into the sphere of our own considerations and interests and our prayers.

[12:14] Because I believe that there are still in this land of ours of praying people and their prayers are very mighty.

[12:27] They're like a trumpet, and we shall go into that matter when we come to the second point of our text. But what a great thing it is to be among the praying people of God.

[12:39] Prayer is a mighty weapon, it's the greatest weapon. And God has placed it in the hands of his own people, though they're very feeble and weak and insignificant.

[12:51] They're not counted by the world and the world. They're disregarded. But God does not disregard them. He hears their prayers.

[13:06] And how important it is that the trumpet, trumpet of the gospel, trumpet, trumpet of the trumpet sound, that can't sound it in these days of ours, we should not, I believe, be in the pitiful condition that we're in, as a nation and as a church.

[13:30] It is the lack of the sound of the real trumpet call from the servants of the Lord that has brought us down into this sad and woeful condition that we're in.

[13:47] Now I feel this, I feel it very keenly. God has honored this nation of ours over a period of time that is considerable, some about 400 years.

[14:04] We have been honored by God. We have been preserved from our enemies. we have been made to prosper as a nation as no other nations in the earth really has.

[14:19] And from these shores of ours there has gone forth to all the nations of the earth language has been for the benefit of those people.

[14:32] people. And now in our own generation, and this is what I feel so keenly, in your generation and in mine, we have seen the end of that God honored period of time when the Lord blessed his nation and his people by granting them liberty from superstition and idolatry and from their enemies.

[14:59] No enemy has been permitted thus far to tread in our shores. Now, I don't want to be in any way topical, but it is an important thing, my dear friends.

[15:19] We ought to be concerned about these things, because if we do not know, if we do not recognize these dangers, we do not pray sufficiently. but if we do realize what we are in, the dangers that we are in, we shall be calling to God.

[15:37] And that can but be a good and blessed thing indeed. Now, as you know full well, we have brought virtually an end to the Reformation by the elevation of diplomatic representation in this country and by the installing of a papal nuns here.

[16:04] That is really virtually the end of the Reformation politically. But have you noticed one thing? That the two men principally responsible for for that dire move, so much against the best interests of our nation, have both been removed from their office in shame.

[16:32] No doubt these men thought they could introduce this measure because the Protestant people of this land were largely asleep.

[16:43] And that may have been a truth, but what they have forgotten is this, that he who keepeth Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps, and his retribution upon them has been wonderfully swift.

[17:05] But it has not removed the great curse and the great evil on our nation. and now we have this situation that we are faced with as a nation of war, but it may well be that those of us who have prayed that the Pope might not set foot upon these shores of ours is prevented from coming by the hostilities against this nation that has suppressed and imprisoned our people in the Fortland Islands.

[17:52] Now I've said that and I'm not going further with it, but I want you to remember these things because you will pray if you feel that they're true, you will pray that the Lord might hear and deliver you and help us as a people.

[18:10] But what a blessed thing it is that God has provided a trumpet, a trumpet to give an alarm to his people. The gospel is not only a gospel with a message of joy to the hearts of sinners, it's also a message of alarm to the people of God.

[18:36] And it is also a message which calls them together and bids them go forth. As I said just now, every journey that was taken by the children of Israel was preceded by the sound of a trumpet.

[18:56] And you know, it's a great thing if we look at this personally and individually. if you are a real believer in the Lord, you'll want the Lord to speak to you and sound the trumpet of his directing love and mercy in every step you take.

[19:16] You dare not move if you have the fear of God in your heart unless you hear the sound of this trumpet. you cannot go to the east or to the west or forward or backward unless you can hear clearly the Lord directing you by his word and the trumpet of his gospel.

[19:40] then again how precious to hear this trumpet as we read in the 27th of Isaiah it sounded right to the very ends of the earth.

[19:57] No limitation to it, no diminution. Everyone that heard it was brought by the sound of it.

[20:10] to settle down in Jerusalem and under the kingship of Christ and the Lord God Almighty.

[20:22] It was a marvellous, wondrous trumpet. Have we ever heard it? Oh, when that blessed trumpet sounds forth in the ears of a dear of a poor troubled soul, tried and tempted to the extreme how precious that sound is.

[20:48] There's no sound to be compared with the sound of the gospel. With that glorious voice that speaks to the heart and conscience of the people, there's nothing to be compared with it.

[21:06] Man can never imitate it and there can be no substitute for it. God sends it, he makes it, it's a perfect sound, it's produced by a perfect instrument.

[21:22] The gospel is a perfect instrument sound. And therefore, the sound that comes forth from the gospel is perfect in every sense. It's powerful, it's clear, it's sweet, it's penetrating and it's effectual in calling out God's dead elect from darkness to the most glorious light of his grace.

[21:50] And now God says to his people here, when the enemies were coming in like a flood, when they were creeping into the houses and coming over they had the appearance of horses and the noise of chariots, the tops of the mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire devouring the stubble as a strong people set in battle array.

[22:20] That was the, that was the, the, the, the, uh, condition, prevailing condition in, the day of this good man, the prophet Joel.

[22:33] And what does the Lord say? Blow ye the trumpet inside. This was a strange way of dealing with such a tremendous situation.

[22:47] But it's God's way. way. And God's way is the effectual way. This is why we have, it is so important that the gospel should be sounded.

[23:00] It's the only hope for us. There's nothing else, as I said, there's no substitute. And whatever the situation of God's people, his church, or the nation, we're part of the nation, we cannot divorce ourselves from its interest, we should not do so.

[23:21] We are commanded by God to pray for all men. But whatever the condition prevailing in the nation, or the church, or the individual, God's answer for it is this, blow ye the trumpet inside.

[23:40] Send out the word of truth. Speak the word as Paul said to Timothy, preach the word, be instant in season and out of season, rebuke, exalt, with all longsuffering and doctrine, but preach the word.

[23:59] That's the great message of God, that's the answer of God for all kinds of conditions. And there's nothing too bad that does not, cannot be dealt with and cured by the glorious gospel of God's grace.

[24:19] And I hope you have found that to be the truth in your own experience. The desperate situations that may possibly have arisen in your own personal situation.

[24:33] Have you not found that the gospel is the remedy? has it not brought you liberty and light? Has it not broken your chains and cancelled your sins and sounded in your heart like a sweet message from heaven itself?

[24:56] Has not Christ made himself known by it and shown himself in it as to be the great speaker? The one who speaks from the highest place as we have in the eighth of Proverbs wisdom speaketh from the highest place of all but he speaks to the lowest place.

[25:23] This is the glorious reality of this trumpet. Though it comes from the highest authority it speaks and is heard by the lowest of all the poor desperate sinner in their deep need who hear the sound shall be released relieved and delivered and saved with an everlasting salvation.

[25:56] Blow the trumpet in Zion. Well now that's the first thing. Now secondly God says here to his servant sanctify a fast.

[26:13] Now what does this mean? A fast was often used in the scriptures as a period of repentance and self examination and recognition that the nation or the church had sinned against God and needed to return to him and to wait upon him.

[26:46] Remember what the Lord Jesus said to those who came to him after the Mount of Transfiguration came down from that Mount with three of his disciples and there was a crowd down below the mountain all in a state and condition of despair and frustration there there was a poor maniac lad who the disciples had made an attempt to cast out the devil from him and had failed and the Lord came upon the scene and he saw the situation in a moment he says bring him to me bring him to me and you remember how he banned the devil to depart from that poor man that lad and he was immediately cured and restored into perfect condition and health and then the

[28:01] Lord says this this kind goeth not forth but by prayer and fasting it is a setting aside of our hearts and minds for prayer that is one thing that this word means sanctify the word sanctified as you know means separating setting aside something God sets aside his elect people Peter says in his first epistle that they are elect according to the foreknowledge of God and the sanctification of the spirit that means to say every one of God's elect will be sanctified separated by the spirit people say oh yes we believe in election but we believe that God elected the people that he knew would hear and receive his gospel and believe in it nothing of the sort election does not pertain unto performance of any creature it's the creature itself that was chosen by God the persons were chosen in

[29:23] Christ irrespective of whatever they might do God of course had provided in his wonderful covenant love love that they should all be sanctified set aside and separated by the spirit's work in their heart but he chose them all in Christ before the foundation of the world for now let us take that up in this second point sanctify a fast says the Lord to his servant let us think of it first of all individually how important it is to set ourselves aside for the purpose of prayer taking this word fasting especially to me to indicate prayer you know we do so often I'm looking into my own heart we so often rush into prayer we make a few harried sentences and then we cease and think that we pray my dear friends to really pray we need to set ourselves aside we need to take ourselves apart so to speak we need to examine ourselves closely and carefully and set aside our motives and our purposes sanctify a fast then again set prayer in the forefront of your hearts and of your mind a person was on a traveling on a ship and this ship was in great danger through storm and tempest and it looked very black it looked almost certainly to possibility of the destruction of the whole ship and all those that sailed in it and this person very nervous and extremely anxious and frightened went to the captain and said to the captain is there any hope for us captain he said the only thing I can say to you madam is our only hope is prayer oh she said has it come to that has it come to that pass now you see that woman was putting prayer the last resort we should always put prayer in the first it should be our first move our first act we should sanctify our own hearts and minds whenever we come to see God at the throne of grace

[32:32] I gave to my own people and the one or two here they will know what I'm talking about the other Sunday little aside really to help them to think of prayer I took the word pray letter by letter I said to them that the letter P should always represent praise prayer should begin with praise we've got so much to thank the Lord for we must come first to those thanksgiving from our hearts to what the Lord has done for us I say then very infantically that prayer should first begin with praise to the Lord you remember how Paul and Silas in the Philippian jail and we read that they at midnight praised the Lord they sang praises to the

[33:40] Lord and what happened I don't doubt for a moment they prayed but it was praise that broke open the prison doors and let them out free men and brought the jailer to the feet of Christ praised then again the next letter R I say this I said this to my people there's no real prayer that can be acceptable to God that isn't clothed with humility and repentance that word that letter R should stand for true repentance Godless are look at the hymn we were singing Jehovah God eternal Lord most high permit a worm to bow before thy throne a worm deserving endless misery who pleads the blood that did for sin at home there's repentance isn't it and it must have that ingredient in it and the word all they stands for all we are exhorted in the word of

[34:54] God to pray for all men oh I think we neglect this we so cover our own little needs and our own wishes and wants and our own circumstances we forget there are people beyond our knowledge who need God and who need help from God who need his mercy and his grace we should pray for all men Paul says pray for all men kings and in authorities magistrates that we may live a peaceful and quiet life yes I believe a praying church where there is prayer for all is a prosperous church a living church church where there is vital godliness in in real display manifestation and then the why yourself oh how we so often reverse this order we pray for ourselves our own little things our own trifles and pains and difficulties they seem to be the only thing we can bring to the Lord in prayer pray for yourselves but let a lot the grave deal go before those prayers for yourselves it's a great thing when a poor sinner begins to pray for themselves when those first vital words issue forth from the heart to the

[36:53] Lord God be merciful to me a sinner the dear dying thief on the cross for the first time was able to pray to the Lord Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom what a prayer that was and you know when Paul was sawed of Tarsus and brought to the Damascus road he was struck down by the Lord and he heard the voice from heaven speaking to him Saul Saul why persecute thou me and he was led by the hand into Damascus and the Lord went to one whose name was Ananias and said go to a street in your town which is called

[37:55] Straight and there's man there Saul Tarsus Lord Lord he said but as soon as he heard the name he said Lord I've heard of this man he's an enemy he's persecuting thy church he's here even in this very city with that one purpose to hail into prison all who really profess thy holy name the Lord says go thy way behold he prayed he prayed that was the only explanation the Lord God gave to Ananias he was a praying soul now a wonderful change had come over him he was now not a breathing out slaughter and threatening against the disciples of the Lord he was praying to the Lord and that meant that there was life and there was grace and there was a spiritual man sanctify the past then exclude another thing

[39:11] I must just say exclude or try to exclude everything else sanctify a past what they used to do was to try and remove everything that might interfere with the purposes of that fast see that nothing came into the intruded into the sphere of the believer when they were fasting and seeking the Lord in prayer now that's an important thing isn't it do you know don't you feel sometimes when you want to pray and try to pray a crowd of things come in your poor mind is diverted and attracted to this that and the other thing again and again with a multitude of of of things and you feel at the end you've hardly voiced a word of prayer to the Lord at all what various hindrances we meet when coming to the mercy seat and how true that is now sanctify sanctify a fast if you would pray seek to exclude everything from your mind let no intrusion come about into your thoughts seek to be alone with God and with the Lord

[40:43] Jesus I would be alone says one in the hymn and oh what a sweet thing that is to be alone with Christ sanctify the fast well then finally tonight is this and call a solemn assembly now what do we to say about this call a solemn assembly well they called the solemn assembly by the trumpet that is how they did it in the Old Testament in the days of the children of Israel going through the wilderness when God saw fit for an assembly of the people of Israel he bade his priests to sound the trumpet and there was an assembly now when this is a beautiful thing really when the trumpet really sounds it will gather the people it will assemble the outcasts of Israel it will bring people together from the north and the south and from the east and from the west they shall come and they shall sit down in the kingdom of God call an assembly set your heart upon the assembly of God's people you may not have the privilege of calling any people together but you may have a sweet participation in this way of loving to be found among the people of God and delighting to meet with them and humbly to bow at the feet of the dear redeemer and in that sense you really in your spirit you are calling an assembly do not despise the assemblings of God's people the word deprived the writer in the

[43:06] Hebrews he says forsake not the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some is and the so much the more as you see the day approaching oh it is a great thing to be among the people of God the dear countess of Huntington said I love to meet among them now and at thy gracious feet to bow though vilest of them all but how can I bear the piercing thought what if my name should be left out when thou for them shall call yes and you know what Jacob dear Jacob said when he was a dying to his sons he was speaking of Judah and he said this the scepter should not depart from Judah nor a lawgiver from beneath his feet until

[44:11] Shiloh come and under him shall the gathering of the people be oh then so it is to Christ that the assembly of God's people is made and therefore we call when we call we take an interest we feel an interest we want to be among these people we believe that there God reigns there he shows his milder faith there his sacred presence is made known and felt when those dear children of Israel in the camp in that wilderness they had very little to bring them any comfort or assurance that they had one thing that was outstanding above all others they had the shekinah glory the cloud and the pillar of fire and that meant the presence of the

[45:19] Lord with them and when he was there what need they fear who need they fear with Christ in the vessel God's people can smile at the storm and call the assembly now my friends I put these things before you try to this evening they're very important try and translate them into your own personal experience and try and also translate them into our own deep need as a nation at this time and let us call upon the Lord let us sound a trumpet pray that the Lord's trumpet might go forth in these days with a clearer sound you see Paul said in the 14th of Corinthians if the trumpet gives an uncertain sound who then will prepare for the battle let us pray that the Lord's may send forth a clear certain sound uncertainty in the things of

[46:31] God is desperate but the clear clarity of the certain sound of the gospel is decisive and that is what we want and let us pray for it and let us hope the Lord will appear for us and turn our captivity and bring an end to this awful clamor for idolatry and the awful practices that are undertaken by the enemies of God and his gospel I heard the other day that the Pope had said in reference to his recent attempt of assassination he said I don't speak about it much because I think it was such a sacred time and since that time

[47:37] I have become Isaiah's servant now you know what that means do you not Isaiah's servant is the Lord Jesus Christ behold my servant whom I uphold mine elect in whom my soul they're mighty now there's Antichrist he's putting himself in the place of God exactly what the scriptures tell us he will do so my friends we have something before us that we need to stir up our hearts and our minds and we need to look unto the Lord our eyes are up unto the Lord Jehoshaphat when he was beset by Moab and by a multitude of other enemies he went to the

[48:40] Lord he said this to the Lord the Lord we know not what to do but our eyes are upon thee now that is where we must that is our only hope sound the trumpet inside sanctify a fast called the solemn assembly may God bless these few scattered remarks amen мож to to what it you