Do not forsake God

Published by Stanley Pouw in 2016 · 18 September 2016

Amos was a sheep breeder from Tekoa before God called him to be a prophet to Israel. And even though Tekoa is in the southern kingdom of Judah (ten miles south of Jerusalem), Amos delivered his message to the northern kingdom of Israel. His ministry happened in the reign of Jeroboam II, which means that Amos prophesied some 40 to 60 years before the northern kingdom was taken into exile by the Assyrians in 722 BC.

Why Speak the Word of God?

In retrospect we can see that Amos' warning of coming judgment on Samaria, the capital of the northern kingdom, did not cause repentance and did not save the people. So we learn that the Word of God may not always have the effect we desire. But we must be faithful, like Amos, and speak what we are given from the Lord, and trust that He has his secret purposes in all He does, and that they are good.

So don't think it strange that sometimes your own testimony falls on deaf ears. We have to continue to speak the Word of God not for the certainty of converts but the certainty of God's call to repentance. In the words of Amos 7:15, "The Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, 'Go prophesy to my people Israel.'" So perhaps we had better measure its true success not by its effect on Samaria, but by its effect on us sinners who hear this here now.

So the central message of Amos is of judgment. The reason is that the sins of the people causes the wrath of God to grow. And the grace of God is seen in the several calls of these prophets send by God for repentance. What gives Amos his special power and impact even today is the way he exposes the roots of Israel's sin to the light of day. So that is where we want to compare it with our sins today and accept what God has to say to us today.

Prepare to Meet Your God!

The central message of Amos is the prediction that judgment is going to fall on the northern kingdom of Israel. Amos 5:18-20, “Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord! For what good is the day of the Lord to you? It will be darkness and not light. 19 It will be as though a man fled from a lion, and a bear met him; or as though he went into the house and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him. 20 Is not the day of the Lord darkness and not light? Is it not very dark with no brightness in it?”

The word that sets the tone for the whole book is Amos 1:2, "The Lord roars from Zion." That is the keynote. And in Amos 4:12 you hear this warning, “Because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel!” That is the prophecy: the terrible day of the Lord is coming. If you meet Him in your rebellion, you will meet a ravenous lion roaring out of Zion. If you run, you will meet a bear robbed of her cubs. And if you hide in your house, you will be bitten by a rattlesnake on the windowsill. There is no escape for unbelievers on the day of the Lord.

What gives this message of judgment such strength and weight in the book of Amos is the portrait that he gives us of God. Three times he pauses just to paint a picture of who the Lord of judgment is. In Amos 4:13 he tells us who it is we are supposed to prepare to meet, “For behold, He who forms mountains, and creates the wind, who declares to man what his thought is; and makes the morning darkness, who treads the high places of the earth—the Lord God of hosts is His name.”

He knows every thought of your mind before you speak it. He governs all the workings of the solar system, and steps from the Appalachians to the Rockies in one stride. Do you want to meet him roaring from Zion, or rejoicing over us with gladness? Amos pauses again in 5:8 just to ponder who God is, “He made the Pleiades and Orion, He turns the shadow of death into morning, and makes the day dark as night, He calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out upon the face of the earth, and the Lord is His name.”

In other words, prepare to meet the God who builds constellations in space like tinker toys, and spins the earth like spinning a ball, and beckons for a tidal wave like a man whistles for a dog. And in Amos 9:5-6, “The Lord God of hosts, He who touches the earth and it melts, and all who dwell there mourn, all of it swell like the river, and sinks again like the Nile of Egypt; He who builds His layers in the sky, and has founded His strata in the earth; who calls for the waters of the sea, and pours them out on the face of the earth—the Lord is His name.”

Remember Israel, when Amos says the day of the Lord is coming, he means the Creator is coming! What will it mean when the Creator says in Amos 9:4, “I will set My eyes on them for harm and not for good?” So the strong message of this prophecy is the fierce judgment of God coming upon the northern kingdom of Israel. The Creator and Ruler of all things will roar out of Zion against all His enemies. So prepare to meet your God, O Israel!

Forsaking God

Why has God determined such a terrible judgment against his people? What are the sins that lead to this message? We see one main sin which has caused at least three other sins, and together these four sins have caused the wrath of God to grow against Israel. The main sin is that the people have forsaken God. And the three sins that branch off from this rejection of God are addiction to luxury, indifference to honesty, and cruelness against the poor.

Let us investigate these. First, the main sin, Israel has forsaken God. Amos 4:6–11 describes five acts of chastisement that God had performed, each aimed at winning Israel's heart back to God. But the result is the same each time. Verse 6, 8, 9, 10 and 11 say all the same thing, "Yet you did not return to me, says the Lord." The prophet could scarcely make it clearer that the main sin of Israel's judgment is that she is far from God and needs to return.

For many this became outright idolatry, for example in Amos 5:26-27, “You also carried Sikkuth your king, and Chiun your idol, the star of your gods, which you made for yourselves; therefore I will send you into captivity beyond Damascus,' says the Lord, whose name is the God of hosts.” And they rejected of God for example, in their sexual behavior in Amos 2:7 it says, "A man and his father go in to the same girl, to defile my holy name." The root of all sexual sin is an indifference to God's holy name.

There are many people today who, in the Lord's house, talk as if God is real, but in their sexual lives do not ask the question: Does this holy God approve of my behavior and delight in my sexual habits? Another subtle way of rejecting God is expressed by going to church, giving offerings, and singing hymns but having a heart that is far away from God.

Listen carefully, Bethel and Gilgal were central places of worship in Israel, but in Amos 4:4-5 the Lord indicts the hypocrisy of the people, “Come to Bethel and transgress; to Gilgal and multiply transgression; bring your sacrifices every morning, your tithes every three days; offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving of that which is leavened, and proclaim free will offerings, publish them; for so you love to do, O people of Israel!" says the Lord God.

Then Amos 5:21–24 says, “I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your sacred assemblies. 22 Though you offer Me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them, nor will I regard your fattened peace offerings. 23 Take away from Me the noise of your songs; for I will not hear the melody of your harps. 24 But let justice run down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Amos is a devastating Word of God for people who give token attention to God through assemblies and songs, but whose hearts are much more genuinely engaged by money, sports, business, family or hobbies. If your outward acts of worship are a mask to give you some respectability while your heart is really attached to the world and to your own comfort, then God hates your worship and despises your offerings and songs.

So when Amos calls for repentance in 5:4–6, the first thing he says is, “Thus says the Lord to the house of Israel: “Seek Me and live; 5 but do not seek Bethel, nor enter Gilgal nor pass over to Beersheba, for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to nothing. 6 Seek the Lord and live.” In other words, get real with God. Don't equate Him with places of worship or acts of religion. He is a person. Seek Him, know Him and develop a personal relationship with Him.

Addiction to Luxury

But Israel did not return to the Lord, and so out from this main sin of rebellion against God grew three ugly sins that increased God's wrath. Israel became addicted to luxury, they became indifferent to honesty and they did not care about the poor.

They forgot God’s warning in Deuteronomy 8:17-19, “then you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gained me this wealth.’ 18 “And you shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth, that He may establish His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day. 19 Then it shall be, if you by any means forget the Lord your God, and follow other gods, and serve them and worship them, I testify against you this day that you shall surely perish.”

Amos 6:13 says to Israel, "You rejoice in Lo-debar (i.e. nothing) and say, 'Have we not by our own strength taken Karnaim for ourselves?” God had allowed Israel to prosper, and she fell in love with her luxury and boasted in her strength and wealth. Amos gives God's response in 6:8, "The Lord God of hosts says, “I abhor the pride of Jacob, and I hate his palaces!” When God is no longer the treasure of your heart, you will focus on the pleasures and comforts of this life.

Listen to Amos attacking the lovers of comfort in 6:4, "Woe to those who lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches." Verse 6, “who drink wine in bowls and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the affliction of the offspring of Joseph." These are people who live for comfort, and do not grieve over the lost; people who love themselves, and have no idea what it means to love your neighbor as yourself.

There is a warning in Amos 3:15 which hits close to home to middle-class people everywhere that I hesitate to read it. But the Lord says there, "I will destroy the winter house along with the summer house; the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end.” Take heed and guard your hearts diligently, lest you find yourselves enslaved to comfort and addicted to luxury.

Dishonesty and Callousness toward the Needy

The love of comfort leads to dishonesty and callousness toward the needy. Amos attacks this evil in Israel more than any other. Amos 2:6-7 says, “Thus says the Lord: "For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not revoke the punishment; because they sell the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals. 7 they that trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth, and pervert the way of the afflicted.”

In 4:1 Amos gives us a picture of wealthy women in Samaria, “Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are in the mountains of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to their husbands, 'Bring, that we may drink!'" Then in 5:12 he shows how corruption and callousness mingle, “I know how many are your transgressions and how great are your sins—you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe, and turn aside the needy in the gate."

And finally in Amos 8:4–6 we see how hypocrisy and love for wealth, dishonesty and callousness all combine, “Hear this, you who trample on the needy, and make the poor of the land fail, 5 saying, "When will the New Moon be over, that we may sell grain? And the Sabbath, that we may trade wheat, making the ephah small and the shekel large, falsifying the scales by deceit, 6 that we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, and even sell bad wheat?”

These are the sins that feed the wrath of God in Amos' day, and these same sins feed God’s wrath in our day here too! Our sins are shown in rebellion against God (even when cloaked with church attendance), in addiction to luxury and comfort, being indifferent to honesty, and total disregard toward the poor.

Calls to Repentance

Now there are only a few calls to repentance that spring up out of the message of God's wrath. One we saw in Amos 5:6, "Seek the Lord and live." So there is hope for the converted. But Amos makes it clear that conversion is more than just changing your mind about God. It means exchanging the love of comfort for the love of goodness and justice.

Amos 5:14-15 says, “Seek good, and not evil, that you may live, and so the Lord, the God of hosts, will be with you, as you have said. Hate evil, and love good, and establish justice in the gate; it may be that the Lord, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”

What does it mean to have justice established in the gate? It means no more exploitation; no more disregard for the poor, and no more policies who steal from the rich. No more socialist committees who dictate what should happen, and no more rich cats who do not care at all for the poor. No more false advertising. When wages are fair, agreements are kept, and everyone loves his fellow man and all to the glory of God, then justice at the gate will be established.

And how shall we do it? By asking the Holy Spirit to produce people whose hearts are aflame with the righteousness of God. It will not be because Christians push through a prayer amendment, or because Christians push through bigger government subsidies for housing and health and jobs. It will be because the Holy Spirit has exerted such a profound spiritual effect on the heart and soul of people that they feel pangs of conscience when promises are broken and babies are aborted.

If violations of love are not treated at the spiritual source of men’s heart, then the river of evil that flows out of it will break through every legal dam and sweep the world away with injustice. If we, as Christians, are not wholeheartedly engaged in this spiritual work, no one else will do it, for no one else has the Holy Spirit and the message of redemption. So then, who will be able to stand when the Lord roars from Zion? So may the Holy Spirit guide us in evangelism and doing good to all, Amen? Let us pray!