3:1 For look! In those days and at that time I will return the exiles to Judah and Jerusalem.
After Israel receives their national conversion, and after Israel is returned to their land, then God will judge the Gentiles.
3:2 Then I will gather all the nations, and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. I will enter into judgment against them there concerning my people Israel who are my inheritance, whom they scattered among the nations. They partitioned my land,
Israel is the firstborn child of God. God will not be happy about how the Gentiles of the Great Tribulation treat His firstborn. He will not be happy about how the Gentiles treat His divorced wife. Therefore, He will bring all of the Gentile armies to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The Gentile armies are the Gentiles who survive the Great Tribulation. The Valley of Jehoshaphat is the modern Valley of Kidron.
The Gentiles who survive the Great Tribulation will be judged for pro‑Semitism or anti-Semitism. Were they pro-Jewish or anti-Jewish? Did they attempt to protect the Jews, or exterminate them? Did they fear God, or fear the Antichrist?
These Gentiles will be judged on four accounts. First, did they scatter the Jews all over the world, away from their own homeland which God gave them through the Abrahamic Covenant? Second, did they divide up God’s land of Israel and give it to Gentiles? (The United Nations is guilty of this sin today).
3:3 and they cast lots for my people. They traded a boy for a prostitute; they sold a little girl for wine so they could drink.
Third, did the Gentiles enslave the Jews? Fourth, did they sell the Jewish children into prostitution?
3:4 Why are you doing these things to me, Tyre and Sidon? Are you trying to get even with me, land of Philistia? I will very quickly repay you for what you have done!
This is an interesting verse because God is speaking to the nations who will oppress Israel thousands of years in the future. Tyre and Sidon is modern Lebanon. Philistia is the modern Gaza Strip, which is currently being held by the Palestinian Arabs. Both ethnic groups are currently extremely anti-Semitic. They will get worse. God will pay them kind-for-kind, according to the curses of the Great Tribulation.
3:5 For you took my silver and my gold and brought my precious valuables to your own palaces.
Lebanon and the Gaza Strip will be guilty of robbing from the Jewish temple.
3:6 You sold Judeans and Jerusalemites to the Greeks, removing them far from their own country.
Lebanon and the Gaza Strip will be guilty of selling the Jews into Grecian slavery. Notice that Joel makes this prophecy centuries before Alexander the Great even lived.
3:7 Look! I am rousing them from that place to which you sold them. I will repay you for what you have done!
Those future Jewish slaves whom Lebanon and Gaza sell to Greece during the Great Tribulation will be returned back to Israel. God will repay them kind-for-kind, according to the Abrahamic Covenant.
3:8 I will sell your sons and daughters to the people of Judah. They will sell them to the Sabeans, a nation far away. Indeed, the Lord has spoken!
God will sell the Lebanon and Gaza children into slavery in a far-off place. All of the anti-Semites will be judged and sent to a far-off place called hell.
Judgment in the Valley of Jehoshaphat
3:9 Proclaim this among the nations: “Prepare for a holy war! Call out the warriors! Let all these fighting men approach and attack!
This same proclamation is found in Revelation 16:12–16. The Antichrist will gather all of the Gentile armies together in the Valley of Jezreel for a holy war against the Jews. This is the beginning of the Campaign of Armageddon. Satan’s purpose of this campaign is to exterminate the Jews so that they cannot call for their Messiah. God’s purpose is to eliminate all of the enemies of Israel in fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant.
3:10 Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears! Let the weak say, ‘I too am a warrior!’
This is the opposite of “Beat your swords into plowshares” of Isaiah 2:4 and Micah 4:3. Joel was writing about the Campaign of Armageddon. Isaiah and Micah were writing about the Millennial Kingdom. At Armageddon, the armies of the Antichrist will turn all of their agricultural tools into weapons so that they can exterminate the Jews off of this planet. During the Millennial Kingdom, all of the nations will be at peace. They do not need weapons. Therefore, they will turn their weapons into farming tools.
What is war? War is the mass-killing of men on earth and sending them to an eternal destiny of heaven or hell.
The anti-Semitic Gentiles who follow the Antichrist will be very weak, but they will be arrogant enough to think that they are strong enough to defeat Israel. They will be fighting against Jehovah.
The condition of the unregenerate man is that if he survives and observes the miracles of the Great Tribulation, then he will reject Christ, vote the Antichrist into office, take the mark of the beast, and attempt to exterminate Israel from the face of the earth. He will be arrogant enough to think that he can succeed in all of these things.
3:11 Lend your aid and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves to that place.” Bring down, O Lord, your warriors!
The crimes of the Antichrist will be very much like the crimes of the Nazi soldiers. Both cannot wait to begin killing Jews. Jehovah will bring down angels to aid the Jews. This will be a battle fought both physically among humans and spiritually among angels.
3:12 Let the nations be roused and let them go up to the valley of Jehoshaphat, for there I will sit in judgment on all the surrounding nations.
Satan will gather all of the Gentiles in the Valley of Jezreel. The Valley of Jezreel is the Valley of Megiddo. In Hebrew, it is call Armageddon, meaning the Mountain of Megiddo. However, God will change the course of the battle, leading all of the hostile Gentiles to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat is a large valley between Jerusalem and Mount Olives.
3:13 Rush forth with the sickle, for the harvest is ripe! Come, stomp the grapes, for the winepress is full! The vats overflow. Indeed, their evil is great!
The pro-Semite Gentiles are the “sheep” Gentiles who befriended the Jews during the Great Tribulation. They will be reaped into salvation. They will enter the Millennial Kingdom as believing Gentiles.
The anti-Semite Gentiles are the “goat” Gentiles. They persecuted the Jews during the Great Tribulation. They will be treaded as grapes in a winepress. They will die on earth and be sent to hell. No goat Gentiles will enter into the Millennial Kingdom.
The sheep and goat Gentiles are discussed in Revelation 14.
3:14 Crowds, great crowds are in the valley of decision, for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision!
The goat Gentiles violated the Abrahamic Covenant when they attempted to exterminate the Jews. Therefore, they will receive the kind-for-kind curse, bringing upon their own extermination.
The sheep Gentiles blessed the Jews during the Great Tribulation. Therefore, they will be blessed kind-for-kind by the Abrahamic Covenant. The sheep gentiles will enter into the Millennial Kingdom as friends of the Jews.
3:15 The sun and moon are darkened; the stars withhold their brightness.
This is the fifth and final blackout of the Great Tribulation. God will turn out the lights on the goat gentiles and stomp them in the Valley of Jehoshaphat as a vinedresser in a winepress.
3:16 The Lord roars from Zion; from Jerusalem his voice bellows out. The heavens and the earth shake. But the Lord is a refuge for his people; he is a stronghold for the citizens of Israel.
Jehovah is the Lion of Israel. After He kills His Gentile prey, then He roars out in victory. The heavens and the earth shake, as all evil people have been purged out of the world. There is nothing but believers left in the world. Jehovah was a refuge and a tower for Israel. The Gentiles attempted to exterminate the Jews, but it was the Gentiles who were exterminated.
The Lord’s Presence in Zion
3:17 You will be convinced that I the Lord am your God, dwelling on Zion, my holy mountain. Jerusalem will be holy— conquering armies will no longer pass through it.
The Jews will now be convinced that Jehovah is a God who keeps His promises. The Messiah will bodily live in Jerusalem with His people. There will no longer be any Gentile armies who will ever come against Jerusalem again.
This judgment of the Gentiles described by Joel 3:1–17 is the very same judgment as the sheep and goats judgment described by Jesus in Matthew 25:31–46.
3:18 On that day the mountains will drip with sweet wine, and the hills will flow with milk. All the dry stream beds of Judah will flow with water. A spring will flow out from the temple of the Lord, watering the Valley of Acacia Trees.
In the rest of this book, Joel gives a description of the Millennial Kingdom. The land will be well-watered, producing sweet wine, as were the prior conditions of the Garden of Eden. The cattle will produce an abundance of milk. There will be a new Millennial River, which will flow through the Temple. There will be a new Millennial Temple.
3:19 Egypt will be desolate and Edom will be a desolate wilderness, because of the violence they did to the people of Judah, in whose land they shed innocent blood.
Egypt will be desolate for forty years (Ezekiel 29:8-14). Edom will be desolate for the entire 1,000 years. Edom will be a prison cell for demons who are awaiting the Great White Throne Judgment.
3:20 But Judah will reside securely forever, and Jerusalem will be secure from one generation to the next.
Israel will finally experience shalom, meaning the peace and security of God. There will be no anti‑Semitic nations attempting to exterminate them.
3:21 I will avenge their blood which I had not previously acquitted. It is the Lord who dwells in Zion!
Israel will experience a national salvation. Jehovah will live inside the nation of Israel on earth with His chosen people.