1This is what the LORD said to Joel, son of Pethuel.

2Listen to this, you leaders! Open your ears, all inhabitants of this land! Nothing like this has ever happened in your lifetime or in your ancestors' lifetime.

3Tell your children about it. Have your children tell their children. Have your grandchildren tell their children.

4What young locusts leave, mature locusts will eat. What mature locusts leave, adult locusts will eat. What adult locusts leave, grasshoppers will eat.

5Wake up and cry, you drunks! Cry loudly, you wine drinkers! New wine has been taken away from you.

6A strong nation attacked my land. It has too many soldiers to count. They have teeth like lions. They have fangs like grown lions.

7They destroyed my grapevines. They ruined my fig trees. They stripped off what they could eat, threw the rest away, and left the branches bare.

8Cry loudly like a young woman who is dressed in sackcloth, mourning for the man she was going to marry.

9Grain offerings and wine offerings are no longer brought to the LORD's temple. The priests, the LORD's servants, mourn.

10Israel's fields are ruined, and the ground is dried up. The grain has been destroyed. The new wine has dried up. The olive oil has run out.

11Be sad, you farmers! Cry loudly, you grape growers! Mourn for the wheat and the barley. The harvest is destroyed in the field.

12The grapevines are dried up. The fig trees are withered. The pomegranate, palm, and apricot trees, as well as all the trees in the orchards, have died. Yes, the joy of these people has died too.

13Put on your sackcloth and mourn, you priests. Cry loudly, you servants of the altar. Spend the night in sackcloth, you servants of my God. Grain offerings and wine offerings are withheld from your God's temple.

14Schedule a time to fast! Call for an assembly! Gather the leaders and everyone who lives in the land. Bring them to the temple of the LORD your God, and cry to the LORD for help.

15This will be a terrible day! The day of the LORD is near, and it will come like destruction from the Almighty.

16Food disappears right before our eyes. Happiness and rejoicing disappear from our God's temple.

17Seeds shrivel up in their shells. Storehouses are destroyed. Barns are ruined. The grain has dried up.

18The animals groan. Herds of cattle wander around confused. There's no pasture for them. Even flocks of sheep are suffering.

19O LORD, I cry to you for help! Fire has burned up the open pastures. Flames have burned up all the trees in the orchards.

20Even wild animals long for you. Streams run dry. Fire has burned up the open pastures.