Joel 2:11

And the LORD shall utter his voice before his army: for his camp [is] very great: for [he is] strong that executeth his word: for the day of the LORD [is] great and very terrible; and who can abide it?

Ver. 11. And the Lord shall utter his voice before his army] In the head of his army, as generals used to do for encouraging the soldiers. A general should be like Quintilian's orator, Vir bonus, dicendi peritus, both valiant and eloquent, as was Cato Censorius, Optimus Orator, Optimus etiam Imperator, saith Pliny; and Julius Caesar, and Hunniades, who were masters of speech as well as men of their hands; Si actu eius penitus ignorasses, per linguam tamen militem esse diceres, ut quidam de Caesare. So was Joab, David's general, of whose speech to the army, 2 Samuel 10:12, Pellican saith, Non potuit vox Duce dignior cogitari, A braver speech could not have been uttered by the mouth of a mortal. But here God himself uttereth his voice before his army; for "the Lord is a man of war," Exodus 15:3, a victor of wars (as the Chaldee there hath it), and what wonder, since "the voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is full of majesty," Psalms 29:4, he sets on and gives the signal of the battle to these locusts, he puts spirit into them and cries, Courage, my hearts; and thence it is that they are so valorous and victorious.

For his camp is very great] His camp these locusts are called, though they knew it not. He hisseth for the fly of Egypt, and for the bee that is in the land of Assyria. And they shall come and rest all of them in the desolate valleys, Isaiah 7:18,19. The Assyrian is the rod of God's anger, and the staff in his hand. "I will send him," saith the Lord, "against an hypocritical nation, to avenge the quarrel of my covenant. Howbeit he meaneth not so, neither doth his heart think so," Isaiah 10:5,7. But it is here as when, in applying horse-leeches, the physician seeketh the health, of his patient, the leech only the filling of his gorge. Almighty God, as he disposeth and ordereth membra culicis et pulicis, as Austin hath it, the members of the meanest creatures; so by the same power and providence he overruleth all their motions, to his own glory.

For he is strong that executeth his word] Or, that thing is strong, that weak locusts, set awork by God, shall do his will vigorously (and not faintly, as Jer 48:10), shall go throughstitch with it, and none shall hinder it.

For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible] Tremble, therefore, and humble under this mighty hand of God; let this earthquake work in you a heartquake, these horrible commotions and calamities draw from you a shower of tears, or at least a storm of sighs, for your sins; unless ye hold it better to be carnally secured than soundly comforted.

Who can abide it] Or else avoid it, otherwise than by repentance? Amos 8:12. Fly, saith a reverend man, from God's anger to God's grace. Bloodletting is a cure of bleeding; and a burn a cure against a burn. Running to God is the way to escape him; as to close and get in with him that would strike you doth avoid the blow.