Amos 6-9

Chapter 6.  On My.  Woe! (remember that is a HUGE word…Meaning WARNIG TO YOU…HOW HORRIBLE IS….)

• Woe to you who are complacent and feel secure
• you who put off the evil day
• who lie in beds with inlaid ivory and lounge on your couches
• who dine on the finest of foods
• who just sit and strum away to music
• who drinks wine by the bowlfuls
• and uses the finest products
• who DO NOT grieve over the ruin of our neighbors (local and foreign)

Therefore, you will be among the first to go into exile; your feasting and lounging will end.

Well…take that in for a minute.

Chapter 7-9 are the 5 visions of judgment.  God will show them a vision of Locusts, fire, a plumb line (His standard), opposition of Amaziah, vision of summer fruit, a doorposts..

 I will make that time like mourning for an only son
       and the end of it like a bitter day.

For me I thought, He will make them feel as the Lord knows he is going to feel on the day of the Crucifixion.  Then the Lord, through Amos not only describes the destruction of Israel, like grain through a sieve BUT then he reminds us of His Covenant!  His line of David will be restored (the remnant).  As when he sifts us like wheat to get out all our pebbles, He then can restore us to be like His gardens and fruit!  IT is all part of the process.

throughout history God has always preserved a remnant of His people.  See below.

People or Group	Reference
Noah and his family in the floodJoseph in Egypt during the famine Israel to their homeland7,000 who had not worshipped Baal Portion of Judah after captivity Remnant to Zion The Church-both Jews and Gentiles	Gen 7:1Gen 45:7 Deut 4:27-311  Kings 19:18 Is. 10:20-23 Mic. 2:12; 13 Rom 9:22-27

Amos 1-5

So Amos was from Judah and he goes to Israel and needs to give them a message.  How does he get their attention? By opening his dictation with their enemies announcement of judgement.  Oh I can see it now, the people gathering more and more as he announces the next enemy that will be destructed and then the next.  And for each one he gives a ‘becasue’.

• Damasas (capital of Aram), attacked Israel
• Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Ekron are major cities in the Philistia, thus the verse about the Philistines
• Tyre (Phoenicia) several treaties were made there, as allies, and they broke their word.
• Edom (Edomites, Esau’s descendants) need I say more
• Ammon and Moab.  (Lot’s children with his daughter)  These 3 wicked nations have been the center of idol worship and idolotry.  Even though Israel has followed their culture, they never missed an opportunity to attack them
• Judah (south) for rejecting the Lord and neglecting God’s law

So now that he has their attention, he lays on them a message regarding their own judgement. Ouch.

• Israel (north) for their greed, unjust ways, their fake outward worship to the Lord.

Chapter 4 (I listened to a Piper Podcast on it) and it blew me away.  Starting in 4:4 you have to know the Lord is speaking in Sarcasm (my favorite language).  The Lord says (paraphrase)…Go ahead, go to Bethel (not even a proper place of worship) and keep sinning.  Man’s way of worship is sinful!  You bring me religion and tithes all week long, and even brag about how “rich” your way of worship is.  Then the Lord basically tells them of the WARNINGS He has been giving them, 5 big one.  Let me see if I can modernize this for you.  “Israel, I have collapsed your stock market, I have set earthquakes and fires on you,  I have caused great flooding and even forest fires…yet you still don’t see my strength…You have left me no choice America, I mean Israel, I am almost our of patience with you”  “Therefore (verse 12) PREPARE TO MEET YOUR GOD.

The rest of the reading for me was good only I wish I had more time to look up the cross references.  Israel at the time was at the top of the ‘stock market ‘and completely ignored God’s law on support and provision for the less fortunate and poor (Hmmmmm that sounds familiar).  Amos even compares the woman of Israel to the cows of Bashan. (Cows of Bashan pampered and very well fed to fatten them up…and then slaughtered)

THEN chapter 5.  Hear this Word!  Seek me and Live!!!  Please take all these prophet books as Love books not judgement.  God knows the way His people are living is wrong and a slippery slope.  The rich get richer, the poor are starving, they worship other gods and practice paganism practices.  Violence and greed are at a high and God repeatedly is saying Repent.  Turn from your ways.  SEEK me!  That is all He is asking.  It will get so bad that He will have to intervene to save us from ourselves.  The good thing is when that does not work His love for us is so much so that He sends us Jesus.

Amos Overview

The Book of Amos addresses the excessive pursuit of luxury, self-indulgence and oppression of the poor which characterized the period of prosperity and success in the Northern Kingdom of Israel under Jeroboam II.  This book is basically a message of judgment: prophecies of judgment on the nations, and against Israel.  Amos begins with a series if indictments against the seven neighbors of Israel then Israel  itself.

The rich are condemned because of their oppression of the poor and for their religious hypocrisy.  Religion is more than holding a sacred assembly or a ritualistic hour on Sunday morning.  And if we have learned nothing it is that lighting a candle to anyone else, worshipping in a high place,  or any other idolorty is detestable to the Lord. True religion demands righteous living, and the way people treat others reveals their relationship with God.

Amos was a prophet from Judah (southern) with a message to Israel(northern) during the reign of Uzziah (south) and Jeroboam (north).  Imagine giving a message of doom to the other team?  Ugg.   Amos will remind you of David and Gideon in that they were just at work, doing their job when God called them up to do His work. (usually when we least expect).  Amos was not a prophet before, a son of a prophet, or even a priest like Samuel.  He was just a sheepherder, however from his writing we can assume he was educated.

The two kingdoms during this time are at an all time high.  Peace with neighbors, Assyria was not as powerful, and prosperity was growing.  Listen, God is not against prosperity, God is against sin.  Unfortunately usually with increased prosperity comes increased sin.

Amos goes to Bethel  because Bethel was the capital of the Northern Kingdom.  Idolatry was everywhere.  As you may recall from reading 2 Kings they were worshipping a golden calf and going through the ‘religious motions’.  Since the division of the nation into North and South 200 years has passed.  God has already sent Elijah, Elisha, and Jonah.  With not a single degree of the nation turning from their sinful ways, God now sends people like Amos and Hosea at the same time to warn them.  This time the Lord wants the message delivered courageously and directly, and Amos will do just that.  People who think that God is all about wrath and punishment need to dig into the Prophecy books.  He loves His people so much that He is giving them opportunity after opportunity of warning to repent!  And He is IGNORED.

I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. (Jonah 4:2)