Amos
Major Points From The Minor Prophets
Pastor Brandon Ball
09/27/2023
Amos
Amos 9:11-15 (opening text)
There were only about thirty or forty years between the ministries of Elisha and Amos, but in that short span of time the whole world changed. A new superpower, Assyria, stalked onto the international stage.
The emergence of Assyria changed everything for Israel and Judah. These two small sister-nations standing astride the caravan routes to Egypt were natural targets for warlike Assyria. The Jews desperately needed to get right with God because they had no other defense against this ominous northern power. Assyria’s policy was to use terror and propaganda to soften up any opposition and to deploy its irresistible military might against all who offered even the slightest resistance.
No alliances could save Israel (then and now) from ultimate invasion. God was her only defense.
A new breed of prophets was needed so God raised up the writing prophets. The miracle-working prophets, Elijah, and Elisha had pointed men to God’s works. The new breed performed no miracles; instead, they pointed men to God’s Word.
When the first of the new breed appeared like new stars in the prophetic sky, the Hebrews did not even know it was getting dark. Their kings were strong, capable, and vigorous. Amos preached to a generation that had grown up never knowing defeat. Surrounding kingdoms such as Syria, Philistia, Ammon, Moab, and Edom had been put in their place and the borders of Israel and Judah were as secure as they had been in the palmy days of David and Solomon.
In the cities people were preoccupied with getting rich. Using money extorted from the poor, the grandees of the court were building mansions. Not even an earthquake could shake the pride of the wealthy. “The bricks are fallen down, but we will build with hewn stones: the sycamores are cut down, but we will change them into cedars,” they boasted (Isaiah 9:10).
To such a society came Amos with his own brand of thunder. Amos was a rustic from that wild stretch of land way down south known as the wilderness of Judah. He was a herdsman, shepherd, and gatherer of sycamore fruit—in other words, a farmhand. What this country boy saw when he went to Beth-el and Samaria, made his blood boil. He had heard about the calf worship of the Israelites for years and now he saw it himself. Worse than that, he saw people snared in all the vileness of the Canaanite nature-cults. The immorality, drunkenness, and gross idolatry filled his soul with outrage. Deeply stirred, he denounced what he saw with an eloquence that drew its inspiration from farm, forest, and field. Wild beasts, starry skies, and threatening storms were the images of his wrath.
Hosea spoke the language of love; Amos spoke the language of law. Hosea spoke from the heart; Amos spoke from the head. Hosea thought in terms of God’s outreach; Amos thought in terms of God’s outrage. Hosea expressed fervor and fire; Amos stated causes and conclusions.
Amos used repetition to hammer home what he discerned and deduced: for example “Yet have ye not returned” occurs in 4:6, 8, 9, 10; “Hear this word” and kindred expressions occur in 3:1; 4:1; 5:1; 7:16; 8:4. He piled up arguments, as in 8:7, 9, 10, 11 where he kept repeating “I will,” and in 5:4, 6, 8, 14 where he kept repeating “Seek.” Amos was also fond of using the word “though” to emphasize his points (see 5:22; 9:2, 3, 4).
Lands Near to God’s People (1:3–2:3)
- Those Always Considered As Gentile Foreigners by Israel (1:3–10)
Amos directed his opening broadsides against three troublesome neighboring nations that had no blood ties with the Hebrew people.
Damascus (1:3–5)
Tyre (1:9–10)
Gaza (1:6–8)- Those Considered Genetic Family by Israel (1:11-2:3)
Edom (1:1-12)
Ammon (1:13-15)
Moab (2:1-3)
Sins:
We find the crowning sin of Edom in Amos 1:11: “He did pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually, and he kept his wrath for ever.” In reply to Edom’s undying malice, God summoned the Assyrians and then the Babylonians to wage war on that haughty country and to leave its cities and strongholds in the dust. Edom’s sin and its final doom was the special burden of Obadiah.The people of these nations chose gods like themselves. The Ammonites, who indulged wanton ferocity (1 Samuel 11:1–3), chose Moloch, who had to be propitiated with the sacrifice of living children.
Moab’s sin revealed a spiteful state of soul that called for God’s judgment. Indulging a spirit of, Moab “burned the bones of the king of Edom into lime” (2:1). But the crowning sin of Judah was worse than that of any of the surrounding heathen nations.
I. The Curse of
Judgment on Judah
4 Thus says the LORD: “For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment, because they have rejected the law of the LORD, and have not kept his statutes, but their lies have led them astray, those after which their fathers walked. —Amos 2:4 (ESV)Solomon had imported wholesale idolatry into Jerusalem. From time-to-time godly kings would try to root it out, but it always revived. Nothing could have more completely negated God’s law.
God had commanded: “Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image” (Exodus 20:3–4). When God’s people transgressed these commandments, they transgressed all His commandments. The fact that they turned to idolatry proved that they had rejected His law.
“Their lies caused them to err,” thundered Amos. They turned their backs on God’s truth and embraced falsehood. Then they believed the lies they had chosen. Liars always end up believing their own lies. What they once knew to be false, they soon believe to be true.
Turning against the truth was the source of Judah’s subsequent sins, just as it is the source of our sins today. Like Judah of old, we have turned our backs on the Bible, the anchor of absolute truth. We have substituted it with humanistic philosophies.
Idolatry isabove, or an altogether of God.
In the Bible, it was often in the form of a graven image. (Imagination) (mind)
- This is why we can still be guilty of idolatry in our “hearts” or “minds”.
Anything that takes the place of God, or is the affection of our worship in our lives.
- Food can be an idol.
- Sports can be an idol.
- Work can be an idol.
God was about to judge Israel and Judah’s idolatry and other sins, but they remained ignorant.
6 Is a trumpet blown in a city, and the people are not afraid? —Amos 3:6 (ESV)
II. The Cause of Idolatry
The Disgust of the Lord (5:21–27)
“I hate, I despise your feast days,” God said (5:21). Israel’s entire sacrificial system was out of order. It claimed to be the worship of Jehovah, but was nothing of the kind. The people fondly imagined that their sacrifices earned them God’s favor. Little did they know that their religious practices were an abomination to God. He wanted no part of them. He repudiated the altars of the Israelites and called their music “noise” (5:23).21 “I hate, I despise your feasts,
and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.
22 Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them;
and the peace offerings of your fattened animals,
I will not look upon them.
23 Take away from me the noise of your songs;
to the melody of your harps I will not listen.
24 But let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. —Amos 5:21–24 (ESV)The cause of idolatry is
.
- The closer you get to God, the more unholiness rises to the surface.
- The moment you stop allowing God to change you, it is unholiness.
So, people make justifications for their obstinance to the sanctifying process of God.
After believing their own justifications, they think they can worship God in the same manner as before and that nothing has changed – except, their worship is done in correlation with rebellion.
Much that is done today in the name of religion is equally offensive to God.
It is cursed, as was the religion of Cain, which is the prototype of all false religion.
Cain was neither an atheist nor a worshiper of a false god. He was a false worshiper of the true God. Cain did not like God’s rule, so he tried to approach Him in his own way. Cain’s religion had elements of beauty and order; it was costly and involved much thought and hard work. But God rejected Cain’s religion, as He rejected the false religion of Israel.
The idolatry of the wilderness was revived, as we have seen, by Jeroboam I, the first king of the separated ten tribes. His religion was also a kind of half-service to God.
- Two locations of worship were set up, one in Bethel and the other Dan (north and south).
- The idea was the people wouldn’t have to travel to Jerusalem (a place of inconvenience) to worship.
- It was not wholly pagan, for it acknowledged Jehovah. And it was not wholly pure, for it was idolatrous, it was served by a false priesthood, and it was bolstered by a false religious calendar of events.
- Yet the kingdom of Israel trusted in this false religion. But the object of the Israelites’ trust turned out to be the source of their trouble.
All in all, pure worship to God rejects a worship of convenience.
III. The Cure for Idolatry
4 For thus says the LORD to the house of Israel: “Seek me and live; 5 but do not seek Bethel, and do not enter into Gilgal or cross over to Beersheba; for Gilgal shall surely go into exile, and Bethel shall come to nothing.” 6 Seek the LORD and live, lest he break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and it devour, with none to quench it for Bethel, —Amos 5:4–6 (ESV)
No doubt Amos himself was startled when the voice of the Lord broke in saying, “Seek ye me”.
These places (Gilgal, Beersheba, and Gilgal) were once linked with Jacob, Joshua, and Abraham.
- Abraham had pitched his tent and raised his altar at Beth-el when he first entered the
promised land.- There Jacob had seen his vision of the ladder and been converted.
- At Gilgal Joshua had reinstituted the covenant seal of circumcision. In Gilgal his victorious troops had returned again and again for spiritual renewal during the conquest of Canaan.
- Abraham had dug his well at Beersheba.
Israel should have been able to return to these places in gratitude to God, but they had become polluted centers of idolatry and rank heathenism disguised by the use of Biblical terms and forms.
The cure for idolatry is seeking God, not his works!
The cure for idolatry is seeking God in the, not in the past!
The Visions of the Prophet (7:1–9:10)Amos saw five more pictures of woe as a sign of coming
: the devouring locust, the consuming fire, the probing plumbline, the basket of summer fruit, and the Lord standing ominously upon the altar.
Because of the intercession of Amos, the first two chastisements stopped short of total destruction.
Basket of summer fruit is representative of a “shelf life” – rottenness is inevitable.Lord standing upon the altar as a sign of judgement.
- Altar was always thought of as a place of mercy.
- Because they defiled the altar of mercy, God would bring judgement.
Probing plumbline to ensure a measurement of accuracy.
- Judgement will come and a measurement will be taken, and sinful Israel and Judah will
not meet the requirements.
IV. Confidence in God’s Covenant
There is always a remnant left! A believing people, a called people, a chosen people.
4 This is what the Lord GOD showed me: behold, the Lord GOD was calling for a judgment by fire, and it devoured the great deep and was eating up the land. 5 Then I said,
“O Lord GOD, please cease!
How can Jacob stand?
He is so small!”
6 The LORD relented concerning this:
“This also shall not be,” said the Lord GOD. —Amos 7:4–6 (ESV)A people who will repent, reject idolatry and convenient worship, and love God. Amos 7:7-8 (Christ as our plumb line)
7 This is what he showed me: behold, the Lord was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand. 8 And the LORD said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said,
“Behold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass by them;—Amos 7:7–8 (ESV)
Israel’s (and the New Testament Church) Prosperity Restored (9:13–14)
No longer will locust, famine, drought, and pestilence plague Israel. So bountiful will be the harvests of the millennial reign that “the plowman shall overtake the reaper” (9:13). Before the farmers have finished garnering one season’s bumper crops, it will be time to plow and plant again.
“I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel,” said the Lord (9:14). In other words, He will reverse their long exile and bring them back to the promised land.
The Restoration of Israel
11 “In that day I will raise up
the booth of David that is fallen
and repair its breaches,
and raise up its ruins
and rebuild it as in the days of old,
12 that they may possess the remnant of Edom
and all the nations who are called by my name,”
declares the LORD who does this.
13 “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the LORD,
“when the plowman shall overtake the reaper
and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed;
the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and all the hills shall flow with it.
14 I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel,
and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them;
they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine,
and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit.
15 I will plant them on their land,
and they shall never again be uprooted
out of the land that I have given them,”
says the LORD your God. —Amos 9:11–15 (ESV)