Joel 1

1The word of Yahweh that came to Joel son of Pethuel.

2Hear this, you elders; listen, all who live in the land! Has anything like this happened in your days, or in the days of your ancestors?

3Tell your children about it, and let your children tell their children, and their children the next generation.

4What the cutting locust left, the swarming locust has eaten; what the swarming locust left, the hopping locust has eaten; and what the hopping locust left, the stripping locust has eaten.

5Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you wine drinkers, over the sweet wine, for it has been cut off from your mouths.

6For a nation has come up against my land, powerful and past counting; its teeth are the teeth of a lion, and it has the fangs of a lioness.

7It has laid waste my vine and splintered my fig tree. It has stripped off its bark and thrown it away; its branches are left white.

8Mourn like a young woman dressed in sackcloth, grieving for the husband of her youth.

9Grain offering and drink offering are cut off from the house of Yahweh; the priests, who minister to Yahweh, are mourning.

10The fields are ruined, the ground mourns, for the grain is ruined, the new wine dries up, the olive oil fails.

11Be dismayed, you farmers; wail, you vine growers, over the wheat and the barley, because the harvest of the field has perished.

12The vine is dried up, and the fig tree withers; the pomegranate, the palm, and the apple tree—all the trees of the field are dried up. Surely joy has dried up and gone from the people.

13Put on sackcloth and lament, you priests; wail, you who minister at the altar. Come, spend the night in sackcloth, you ministers of my God, for grain offering and drink offering are withheld from the house of your God.

14Set apart a fast; call a solemn assembly. Gather the elders and all who live in the land to the house of Yahweh your God, and cry out to Yahweh.

15Alas for that day! For the day of Yahweh is near; it will come like destruction from the Almighty.

16Has not the food been cut off before our eyes, joy and gladness from the house of our God?

17The seeds shrivel beneath their clods; the storehouses are desolate, the granaries are torn down, for the grain has dried up.

18How the animals groan! The herds of cattle wander in confusion because they have no pasture; even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

19To you, Yahweh, I cry out, for fire has consumed the pastures of the wilderness, and flames have burned up all the trees of the field.

20Even the wild animals long for you, for the streams of water have dried up, and fire has consumed the pastures of the wilderness.