The Tear That Heals

Main Text: Joel 2:12–17

The Twelve Voices

Joel is the prophet who turns a plague into a pulpit. Out of the ruin of locusts and the shadow of judgment, he calls God’s people to tear their hearts, not just their clothes, and to return to the One who is merciful and compassionate. Joel’s voice rises from the fast to the feast, from the ashes to the outpouring of God’s Spirit. His prophecy is both warning and welcome—a summons to repentance and a promise of restoration. In Joel, the city hears that God still writes hope into its story, even in the day of the LORD.

Return to the Lord

A Call to Repentance

12 
That is why the Lord says,
    “Turn to me now, while there is time.
Give me your hearts.
    Come with fasting, weeping, and mourning.

13 
Don’t tear your clothing in your grief,
    but tear your hearts instead.”
Return to the Lord your God,
    for he is merciful and compassionate,
slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.
    He is eager to relent and not punish.

14 
Who knows? Perhaps he will give you a reprieve,
    sending you a blessing instead of this curse.
Perhaps you will be able to offer grain and wine
    to the Lord your God as before.

15 
Blow the ram’s horn in Jerusalem!
    Announce a time of fasting;
call the people together
    for a solemn meeting.

16 
Gather all the people—
    the elders, the children, and even the babies.
Call the bridegroom from his quarters
    and the bride from her private room.

17 
Let the priests, who minister in the Lord’s presence,
    stand and weep between the entry room to the Temple and the altar.
Let them pray, “Spare your people, Lord!
    Don’t let your special possession become an object of mockery.
Don’t let them become a joke for unbelieving foreigners who say,
    ‘Has the God of Israel left them?’”

Chiastic Structure: Joel 2:12–17

A – Call to return with the heart, not just the ritual (Joel 2:12–13)

     B – God’s character: merciful, compassionate, slow to anger

       C – Hope for blessing replacing curse (v. 14)

       C′ – Assembly of the people for repentance (v. 15–16)

       B′ – Priests intercede, appealing to God’s mercy (v. 17a)

      A′ – Protection of God’s reputation among the nations (v. 17b)

Old Testament | Deuteronomy 9:4-13

4Do not say to yourself—when God, your God, has repelled them from before you—‘Because of my righteousness, God has brought me to take possession of this land,’ and that because of the wickedness of these nations, God is driving them out from before you.

5You are coming to take possession of their land neither because of your righteousness nor because of the integrity of your heart. Rather, it is because of the wickedness of these nations that God, your God, is driving them out from before you, as well as in order to fulfill the promise that God swore to your forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

6You must know that God, your God, is not giving you this land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stiff-necked people.

7Remember—do not forget—how you angered God, your God, in the desert. You have been rebelling against God from the day you went out of Egypt until you came to this place.

8You angered God at Mount Horeb, and God was incensed with you and wanted to destroy you.

9When I ascended the mountain to receive the stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant that God made with you, I remained on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water,

10and God gave me the two stone tablets, inscribed by the finger of God, on which were engraved all the words that God spoke with you on the mountain out of the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly.

11At the end of 40 days and 40 nights, God gave me the two stone tablets, the Tablets of the Covenant.

12God said to me, ‘Arise, descend quickly from here, for your people, whom you have brought out of Egypt, have become corrupt. They have been quick to turn away from the path that I commanded them to follow; they have made for themselves a molten calf.’

13God spoke to me, saying, ‘I have observed this people, and they are indeed a stiff-necked people.

PARDES Reflection (Four Levels of Study)

Peshat (Simple / Surface Level):

Joel calls for sincere repentance to avert judgment.

Remez (Hint / Symbolic):

The tearing of garments in mourning points to the tearing of the Temple veil (Matt. 27:51), revealing God’s mercy.

Drash (Inquire / Interpretive):

Just as Israel’s repentance preserved them from complete destruction, the Church’s humility guards against losing its witness before the nations.

Sod (Secret / Mystical):

The tear in the heart mirrors the divine act of tzimtzum—God contracting Himself to make room for creation. Our repentance is a mystical return to that original space.

Hebrew Word Study

קָרַע (Qara‘) – to tear, rend (v. 13): not violence for destruction, but an opening for restoration. Tearing the heart makes space for the Spirit.

חָנַן (Chanan) – to show favor, be gracious: mercy is not a mood swing in God—it is His covenantal posture.

קָהַל (Qahal) – to assemble, convoke: the same root as Kehillah (community), pointing to repentance as a communal act, not private piety alone.