Friday, September 11, 2009

Reflections on Amos 7


    Amos 07 (Contemporary English Version)

  1. The LORD God showed me that he is going to send locusts to attack your crops. It will happen after the king has already been given his share of the grain and before the rest of the grain has been harvested.
  2. In my vision the locusts ate every crop in the land, and I said to the LORD, "Forgive me for asking, but how can the nation survive? It's so weak."
  3. Then the LORD felt sorry and answered, "I won't let it be destroyed."
  4. The LORD showed me that he is going to send a ball of fire to burn up everything on earth, including the ocean.
  5. Then I said, "Won't you please stop? How can our weak nation survive?"
  6. Again the LORD felt sorry and answered, "I won't let it be destroyed."
  7. The LORD showed me a vision of himself standing beside a wall and holding a string with a weight tied to the end of it. The string and weight had been used to measure the straightness of the wall.
  8. Then he asked, "Amos, what do you see?" "A measuring line," I answered. The LORD said, "I'm using this measuring line to show that my people Israel don't measure up, and I won't forgive them any more.
  9. Their sacred places will be destroyed, and I will send war against the nation of King Jeroboam."
  10. Amaziah the priest at Bethel sent this message to King Jeroboam of Israel, "Amos is plotting against you in the very heart of Israel. Our nation cannot put up with his message for very long.
  11. Here is what he is saying: 'Jeroboam will be put to death, and the people will be taken to a foreign country.' "
  12. Then Amaziah told me, "Amos, take your visions and get out! Go back to Judah and earn your living there as a prophet.
  13. Don't do any more preaching at Bethel. The king worships here at our national temple."
  14. I answered: I'm not a prophet! And I wasn't trained to be a prophet. I am a shepherd, and I take care of fig trees.
  15. But the LORD told me to leave my herds and preach to the people of Israel.
  16. And here you are, telling me not to preach!
  17. Now, listen to what the LORD says about you: Your wife will become a prostitute in the city, your sons and daughters will be killed in war, and your land will be divided among others. You will die in a country of foreigners, and the people of Israel will be dragged from their homeland.

Amos outlined five messages in chapters 3-6 detailing charges God brought against Israel including injustice, exploitation, religious hypocrisy, indulgence, and complacency. Chapter 7 begins to describe five visions Amos had of the coming judgment upon Israel. We see in these visions God's mercy extended toward Israel. At first God proposes the judgment Israel deserves, but in response to Amos' requests decides on a less devastating judgment.

Amos' first vision is of swarming locusts, one of the most feared pestilences of the time. They could swarm so numerous and thick that the sun would become overcast as if there were heavy clouds or even darkness. In the path of these swarms, no vegetation remained, bringing on famine and starvation. There was nothing that could be done about the locusts, and no amount of wealth could produce food in place of what was lost to the locusts. In Amos' vision, the locusts came right at the most vulnerable time when the spring crops had just begun to sprout. There was no way Israel could survive this and Amos petitioned God, on her behalf, to forgive Israel and not let this happen. Amos was not just trying to protect himself. He was from Judah and not susceptible to this judgment. Though he went up to Israel to deliver God's message of judgment, he had a compassion for the people. God heard his prayer and relented of this form of judgment. He didn't relent of any kind of judgment, though. Israel had not repented of her sin and judgment was still called for.

Amos' second vision was of fire. Rather than the locusts, God proposed that Israel be judged by fire that "consumed the great deep and devoured the land." This, too, would be totally devastating and Amos again petitioned God to stop the fire, for Israel was so small and could not survive such a judgment. Again, God relented and stopped the fire. Had Israel been praying to God, repenting of her sin and asking Him not to bring the judgment, they might have been spared. But she gave a deaf ear to the message and totally ignored it. Judgment would come, it just wouldn't be by locusts or fire.

In the third vision Amos saw God standing by a vertical wall holding a plumb line. A plumb line was used to test whether a wall was truly vertical - straight up and down. If, over time, a wall began to settle and lean, the plumb line could detect it, and the wall would be torn down and rebuilt. This was the message of Amos' vision. Israel was no longer straight or true to plumb. She was leaning and needed to be torn down. God would "no longer spare them." The judgment described this time was unalterable. Both the religious and political structures of Israel would be demolished. This was the message earlier in Amos. Israel as a nation would be destroyed and would never again be reclaimed. The call for repentance was made to individuals rather than to the nation because the nation was beyond hope. This destruction of Israel's structures would come by the sword.

Now I try to place myself in this situation to think about what I would do if I were a religious leader at that time. This man Amos arrives from a rival nation with a message of judgment. He has no status as a religious leader even in his home country. He seemingly is a self-proclaimed prophet speaking of the injustices of my nation and the hypocrisy of the religious system of which I am a leader. How would I receive this man and his message? Is he crazy or is he sent by God? Certainly, if he is sent by God, I need to pay attention to what he is saying. But how do I know? One point to consider would be whether there was any truth to what the man said. Another consideration would be to go to God and ask Him to reveal the truth of the situation. Often when our relationship is out of sync with God and we are pulling further and further away from Him, we know in our hearts that this is the case. We just don't let that thought surface enough to a conscious level to admit it to ourselves. If we will turn to God and open ourselves to what He wants to tell us, this heart-knowledge will be be allowed to enter our thinking and God will be able to speak to us.

This was the position in which Amaziah, the chief priest at Bethel, found himself. For him to acknowledge there was any truth to Amos' message he had to accept responsibility for the wrongs of the religious system of which he was a leader. And since Amos' message also involved the political system, acceptance of that message by Amaziah threatened the ire of the king as well. Many, if not most, of us are not strong enough to take such a stand. This proved to be the case with Amaziah. His assessment was that Amos was conspiring against the king and the nation, and he sent that message to the king along with what Amos was saying, "Jeroboam will die by the sword, and Israel will certainly go into exile from its homeland." He did not say this was God's message through Amos, but that it was Amos' message. Then Amaziah told Amos to go back home to Judah and not to ever prophesy again at Bethel. Note, in verse 13, what he says about Bethel. Not that it was God's sanctuary, but that it was the king's sanctuary.

Amos' response to Amaziah was to give a brief defense of himself and then to pronounce God's judgment on him for taking this position. Amaziah was in a position to help call Israel to repentance, but he chose not to. Thus, the judgment by sword would engulf him and his family. He and his family would be exiled, his wife would become a prostitute to help them survive, and his sons and daughters would die by the sword. May we always be open to hear what God has to say to us from the most unexpected sources.

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