Joel 2:23-28

And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.

                                                                                           Joel 2:25


The fullness of God’s blessing upon all flesh. The season is “Now”. Just before the catching away of the Church. (Luke 21:28-33)


The locust ate the fruit of the year’s labor, and not the years. They ate the harvest of fields. God restores those fruit and those harvests which the locusts consumed. We cannot have back our time, but there is a strange and wonderful way in which God can give back to us the wasted  blessings, the un-ripened  fruit of years over which we mourned, the fruit of wasted years.


God says, I will recompense unto you good years, in the room of the years in which the people, nations and tongues, the Governors and kingdoms of vengeance spoiled you, my great army which I sent among you.


Psalm 90:15 Moses prayed the Lord would make them glad according to the days wherein he afflicted them, and the years wherein they had seen evil. This prophecy has come to pass in the time of the Messiah, in which the Lord has done for the people as Moses prayed he would. Many good things come to the people of God as a sufficient recompense for what they endured in times past. Through repentance all which had been lost by sin is restored. Sin deprives the soul of Grace, of its hope of glory, it forfeits heaven, and it merits hell. God through Jesus Christ restores the sinner, blots out sin and its eternal consequences. Ezek 18:21-22 “and as for the wickedness of the wicked he shall not fall thereby in the day that he turneth from his wickedness”. Ezek 33:12 God forgives that wickedness as though it had never been.


God has also promised to reward all which is done in the body (2Cor 5:10) what is evil is cleansed by the Blood of Jesus, and what through his Grace was good and done for love of Him, He rewards whether it was before anyone fell or after his restoration. After David and Peter sinned and then greatly repented God still rewarded all their great faith and patience. When we repent of sin, the Grace of God helps us to rise again with larger grace than before, since we have  both the former grace and in addition this new grace whereby we rise. (Joel 2:23-28)    Be glad then ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord for he hath given you the former rain, moderately and he will cause to come down for you the rain the former rain and the latter rain in the first month. And the floors shall be full of wheat and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil.


The rains are the Holy Spirit (Hosea 6:2-3) (Joel 2:23-28) God is ready to pour it out in fullness. That is the reason He is calling on us to get the sin out of our lives. Repent so He can manifest the glory (Joel2:12-13) Weeping represents the Old Covenant form of repentance. The New Covenant word for repentance means ‘to turn around, to change the way you are going”. In the Old Covenant to weep for your sin and to mourn for it was really all we could do, we could not get born-again. But praise God, in the New Covenant times not only can we have godly sorrow for it (2Cor7:10) but we can also get rid of it by the Blood of Jesus .But Old or New Covenant, repentance is a must for anyone who wants to be in on the move of God. .(Acts 3:19) Repent ye therefore, and be converted that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord. God’s glory is powerful. It forces out sickness and disease out from human bodies. It is the kind of power that will bring in the end time harvest and God is ready to pour it out in fullness. If God pours out the fullness of that glory and we are still hanging on to sin, it will destroy our flesh. So we need to get the sin out, cleanse the temple. Remember we are the temple of God.


God’s goodness and glory are one and the same. That is why God made all His goodness pass in front of Moses. It was the glory Moses wanted to see.(Ex  33:18-19) Moses was not born-again and had sin in him His heart had never been born-again. Sin is darkness. God does not have to kill darkness, when He walks on the scene and His goodness is released in its full force, it is so powerful it just blasts evil into nothingness. That was why God told Moses He would have to hide him from that glory, because if he saw God’s face he would die. That’s the reason God and man had to be separated after the Fall. He had to protect man from the power of His glory. But now God is not separated from us any longer. He is dwelling inside our reborn human spirits and in these last days, He will break forth and overflow from there to touch again the flesh of men.


 The husbandman-The Father is waiting for the harvest that the rains will bring.(John 15:1-5). The wheat is the Word coming alive becoming bread-Jesus is the bread of life. Wine is the Holy Spirit within the believer and Oil is the Holy Spirit upon the believer. The rains renew and refreshes. The rain is the Blessing.(Acts 2: 2-4) In the upper room when the disciples were all in one accord repenting of their sins and praying, And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting, And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and  it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.


 The wind brings life. (Ex 15:8), (Ezek 37:9-10) The wind is the very nature of the Spirit-the Life. (John 3:8)  Fire (Hab 3:4) And His brightness was as the light; he had horns coming out of his hand; and there was the hiding of his power. (1Tim 6:16) ‘Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see; to whom be honour and power everlasting. Amen


Cloud - God’s Glory. (2 Chro 5:13-14) It came even to pass as the trumpeters and singers were as one to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the Lord, and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and praised the Lord, saying, For he is good; for his mercy endureth forever; that then the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of the Lord.   So that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud: for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of God.


If we are in the midst of this outpouring, we have to do like the early Church did (Acts 2:46) says, they continued daily with one accord. They did not stop praying and repenting when the outpouring hit one glorious day. They did not just have a great meeting and then go back to watching T.V serials and get into strife .They stayed in the Word. They stayed in agreement. (2Chro 7:14)  If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land   


Willful sin and an unrepentant heart are dangerous in the midst of a move of God’s glory.  (Acts 5) tells the story of Ananias and his wife Sapphira who lied to the Holy Ghost and withheld part of what they were to give. And they died.


A Christian might be able to get away with hanging on to sin when the rest of the congregation is as cold as he is, but when the fire of God begins to burn and the rivers of the Spirit start to flow, he will have to do one of two things .He will either have to yield to the Spirit and let go of that sin by repenting, or he will have to resist the flood of God’s Spirit and be swept away. We need to be watchful and keep ourselves in submission to God. We must judge ourselves, get sin out of our lives and get right with our brothers and sisters in Christ, and prepare ourselves to be ready for the Glory, for the Glory is here , God will work wonders through us.


 Let us rise up in expectant faith. (Isa 44:3) For I will pour water upon him who is thirsty and floods upon the dry ground. I will pour My Spirit upon your offspring and My blessing upon your descendants. God will use us to bring rivers of His presence to the dry places. He will use us to stir up those who have fallen asleep to shake them to the very soles of their feet and the dead will come alive on every corner of the earth.


          BD21313