Charles Ellicott Commentary Joel 2:12

"Yet even now, saith Jehovah, turn ye unto me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning:" — Joel 2:12 (ASV)

Says the Lord.— The word says is here no common word in the Hebrew. It implies an authoritative and most weighty utterance, as in Psalms 110:1, The Lord said unto my Lord. “The word is used in almost every instance of the immediate utterance of God Himself; more rarely of that of the prophet or inspired organ of the Divine revelations” (Perowne, Commentary on the Psalms, vol. ii., p. 300).

Turn you even to me.—The question, Who can abide it? is left unanswered. But the only possible reply is inferred in the touching appeal which the prophet is inspired by Jehovah to make, that His righteous anger may be averted.