1 The word of the LORD that came to Joel the son of Pethuel.
2 Listen to this, elders; pay attention, all who live in the land! Has anything like this happened in your days, or in your fathers' days?
3 Recount it to your children; your children to theirs, and theirs to the next generation.
4 What the gnawing locust left, the swarming locust has eaten; what the swarming locust left, the creeping locust has eaten; and what the creeping locust left, the stripping locust has eaten.
5 Rouse yourselves, drunkards, and weep! Howl, all who drink wine, over the sweet wine, for it has been snatched from your lips.
6 A nation has invaded my land, strong and without number; it has teeth like a lion's and the jaws of a lioness.
7 It has turned my vine into a ruin and my fig tree into stumps; it has peeled it bare and flung it aside; its branches show white.
8 Mourn like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth.
9 Cut off from the house of the LORD are grain offering and drink offering; the priests, the LORD's ministers, are in mourning.
10 The field is devastated; the soil grieves; for the grain is ruined, the new wine is dried up, the oil gives out.
11 Hang your heads, you farmers; howl, you vine-growers, over the wheat and the barley, for the field's harvest is lost.
12 The vine is withered, the fig tree droops; the pomegranate, the palm too, and the apple tree, all the trees of the field have dried up. Yes, joy has shriveled away from the sons of men.
13 Gird on sackcloth and mourn, priests; howl, you who serve at the altar. Come, lie all night in sackcloth, servants of my God, for grain offering and drink offering are kept back from the house of your God.
14 Set apart a fast as holy; call a solemn gathering; bring together the elders, all the people of the land, to the house of the LORD your God, and cry out to the LORD.
15 Ah, that day! For the day of the LORD is near; like ruin from the Almighty it is coming.
16 Has not our food been taken away while we watch, and gladness and joy from the house of our God?
17 Under their clods the seeds have shriveled; the storehouses stand empty, the granaries are pulled down, because the grain has failed.
18 How the animals moan! The herds of cattle wander bewildered, for they have nowhere to graze; even the flocks of sheep bear the punishment.
19 To you, O LORD, I call out, because fire has devoured the grazing lands of the wilderness and flame has set every tree of the field ablaze.
20 Even the wild animals long for you, for the streams of water are dried up, and fire has eaten up the open pastures.