1 Kings 8:29-30

8:29 Night and day may you watch over this temple, the place where you promised you would live. May you answer your servant’s prayer for this place. 8:30 Respond to the request of your servant and your people Israel for this place. Hear from inside your heavenly dwelling place and respond favorably.

Joel 1:13-20

1:13 Get dressed and lament, you priests!

Wail, you who minister at the altar!

Come, spend the night in sackcloth, you servants of my God,

because no one brings grain offerings or drink offerings

to the temple of your God anymore.

1:14 Announce a holy fast;

proclaim a sacred assembly.

Gather the elders and all the inhabitants of the land

to the temple of the Lord your God,

and cry out to the Lord.

1:15 How awful that day will be!

For the day of the Lord is near;

it will come as destruction from the Divine Destroyer.

1:16 Our food has been cut off right before our eyes!

There is no longer any joy or gladness in the temple of our God!

1:17 The grains of seed have shriveled beneath their shovels.

Storehouses have been decimated

and granaries have been torn down, for the grain has dried up.

1:18 Listen to the cattle groan!

The herds of livestock wander around in confusion

because they have no pasture.

Even the flocks of sheep are suffering.

1:19 To you, O Lord, I call out for help,

for fire has burned up the grassy pastures,

flames have razed all the trees in the fields.

1:20 Even the wild animals cry out to you;

for the river beds have dried up;

fire has destroyed the grassy pastures.

Joel 2:15-17

2:15 Blow the trumpet in Zion.

Announce a holy fast;

proclaim a sacred assembly!

2:16 Gather the people;

sanctify an assembly!

Gather the elders;

gather the children and the nursing infants.

Let the bridegroom come out from his bedroom

and the bride from her private quarters.

2:17 Let the priests, those who serve the Lord, weep

from the vestibule all the way back to the altar.

Let them say, “Have pity, O Lord, on your people;

please do not turn over your inheritance to be mocked,

to become a proverb among the nations.

Why should it be said among the peoples,

“Where is their God?”