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Valley of Decision

Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision.1

Recently I saw this blood moon, over the rolling hills of Kansas. It was a spectacular sight and peeked my curiosity. A 'blood moon" refers to the blood color the moon takes on during an eclipse. Some have attributed the recent tetrads of eclipses as signs of God impending judgement. What is clear to me, it is a time of decision, for God's people. 

In the book of Joel the prophet writes that nothing has been seen like this: Israel is being plundered by a ferocious enemy, a northern army. There is a cry to give ear, you elders, awake, you drunkards, awake, For a nation has come up against My land, strong, and without number; his teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he has the fangs of a fierce lion.2  This nation has laid waste to His vine, ruined His fig tree, stripped it bare and thrown it away... The field is wasted, the land mourns... the harvest of the field has perished... All the trees of the field are withered; Surely joy has withered away from the sons of men. 

 Sound an alarm, tremble; For the day of the Lord is coming, For it is at hand: A day of darkness and gloominess, A day of clouds and thick darkness... Like the morning clouds spread over the mountains. A people come, great and strong, The like of whom has never been; Nor will there ever be any such after them, Even for many successive generations. A fire devours before them, And behind them a flame burns; The land is like the Garden of Eden before them, And behind them a desolate wilderness; Surely nothing shall escape them. 

 Like the speed of horses they run, marching in rank, over mountains they leap, as of the noise of chariots, and the noise of a flaming fire that devours the stubble. Like a strong people set in battle array. a nation has invaded God's land. Before them the people writhe in pain; All faces are drained of color. The earth quakes before them,The heavens tremble; The sun and moon grow dark, And the stars diminish their brightness. 

 Blow the trumpet! Call a sacred assembly, Consecrate a fast, Gather the people, Sanctify the congregation, Assemble the elders, Gather the children and nursing babes; Let the bridegroom go out from his chamber, And the bride from her dressing room. Let the priests, who minister to the Lord, Weep between the porch and the altar; Let them say, “Spare Your people, O Lord, And do not give Your heritage to reproach, That the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples,‘Where is their God?’”

 Then the Lord will be zealous for His land, And pity His people. The Lord will answer and say to His people... I will no longer make you a reproach among the nations... I will remove far from you the northern army, And will drive him away into a barren and desolate land... So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, my great army which I sent among you.4 

Teeth and fangs of a fierce lion, this enemy has laid waste to His vine, ruined His fig tree.5  Lion of Judah is the symbol of the Jewish tribe of Judah. Jesus is referred to as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. "Weep not: behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah the Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll, and to loose the seven seals thereof."6 Jesus said, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser."7 A branch cannot bear fruit apart from the vine, laid waste. The fig tree is a symbol of Israel's national privilege. Jesus cursed the fig tree as it looked like it produced fruit, but did not.8 His people are in the valley of decision, of judgement, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve.9 
If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.10

This is the Lord's army, an army that the land has never seen before, it is approaching His people. "The Lord gives voice before His army, For His camp is very great; For strong is the One who executes His word. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; Who can endure it?" But if His people repent He will drive away this northern army. This clearly begins as prophetic word that if His people do not repent God will bring this army upon His people. A army of chewing, swarming, crawling, and consuming locust! It is also clear that if there is a returning to God, there will be a refreshing of the land. When Joel prophesies, the kingdom is divided between the northern tribes, Israel, and the southern ones, Judah.11

When Solomon finished the Temple, God spoke to Him, if you will walk before me as David your father walked, doing according to all that I have commanded you.15  Then He would establish Solomon's throne and the house (Temple) Solomon had built and that He would inhabit the House, but if not "then I will pluck you up from my land that I have given you, and this house that I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples."16  "Why has the LORD done thus to this land and to this house? They will say, ‘Because they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers...'"

Because Solomon turned his heart from God, God divided the kingdom. Joel was prophesying to the southern tribe of Judah. Eventually because of their unrepentant hearts they were dispersed into all the nations. Isaiah pleads with Israel, what more could God have done? He compares Israel to a vineyard God planted, "He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit."12 Jesus compared the kingdom of heaven to a vinedresser, A man planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a wine vat, and built a watchtower... He sent servants to gather the harvest but they killed his servants and finally he sent His son but they killed His son. "What will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others."14

Joel prophesies, that if the people return to God, it would come to pass, that I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh;Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, Your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.17  Peter reiterates this same prophecy of Joel, concerning the new covenant.18 God would remove our hearts of stone and replace them with a heart of flesh. Because of Jesus, this righteous branch, God is pouring out His Spirit, by which we are born again, we are God's people. Today God inhabits our bodies as His Temple, we are living stones being built up into a spiritual temple, but He puts those same conditions on His Temple today, as he said to David, as long as you are doing according to all that I have commanded you, I will inhabit.

There is a spiritual Jew and a heavenly one, an earthly Jerusalem and an Heavenly one. Today, scripture has been put together from all over the Bible to form an end time doctrine; rapture, seven years of tribulation, battle of armageddon, millennium reign... put together from scripture based upon what God has revealed to end time prophets. Or did He? What are we to believe? It is clear an earthly Israel that has been brought back. "For behold, in those days and at that time,When I bring back the captives of Judah and Jerusalem, I will also gather all nations, And bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat; And I will enter into judgment with them there On account of My people, My heritage Israel, Whom they have scattered among the nations;"19 

The message for then is clear and if the message is also for us today, then the message is still the same. Repent. This prophecy of Joel is to God's people, if, Israel, repented and returned to Him, he would heal their land. It is sad that the multitudes in the valley of decision, is because His people, who were to be a city on a hill, a light to the world, would not return to Him. It was the failure His people to repent, to turn back to Him, that brought on this judgment of the nations. Joel was sent to warn them. 

 Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Come, go down; For the winepress is full, The vats overflow— For their wickedness is great.20 Like David, a righteous branch, a remnant, God seeks. In one man, Noah, God continued the human race. In one man, the seed of David, God fulfills His promise of inheritance. Will He find 50, 40, 30, 20, 10, will He find 1?Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. And what will you do? Will he find a remnant, a people who will return to Him with all their heart, who will care not for their lives? 

The message today is also clear, repentance begins in the house of God. "Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning.” So rend your heart, and not your garments; return to the Lord your God, For He is gracious and merciful, Slow to anger, and of great kindness; And He relents from doing harm. Who knows if He will turn and relent, And leave a blessing behind Him."21 

Whom Shall I Fear

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