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| Order Of Worship (Liturgy) |
AMOS 1:1-2:5
(Reading: Amos 1:1-2:16)
Close To Home!
Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ…
The Scriptural teaching on punishment for sin doesn’t have such a high profile amongst churches nowadays.
While at one time many pulpits were known for their hellfire and brimstone sermons, it is a teaching that doesn’t seem to fit the sensitive new age which we live in.
There will be many a message about positive self-esteem and that believe-in-yourself philosophy which modern psychology has brought into Christianity.
The consequences of not being saved by faith in Jesus Christ, however, are very, very, rarely heard.
Such words as those preached by Jonathan Edwards in his famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” are not common in our time.
That sermon is about the predicament of the sinner, and especially how dreadfully he dangles just before he plunges to eternal agony, while he has time to repent and be saved.
As Edwards cries out, “let every one that is yet out of Christ, and hanging over the pit of hell, whether they be old men and women, or middle aged, or young people, or little children, now hearken to the loud calls of God’s word and providence.”
And further on he continues, “let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the wrath to come.
“The wrath of Almighty God is now undoubtedly hanging over a great part of this congregation.
“Let every one fly out of Sodom: ‘Haste and escape for your lives, don’t look behind you, escape to the mountain, lest you be consumed.”
That sermon was based on verse 35 of Deuteronomy 32.
It was from the song Moses wrote as he reflected on what happened when the Lord’s people left his ways.
A song Israel was meant to keep on singing to be reminded of these things and so keep away from them.
A song which in Amos’s time isn’t being sung!
How can we know?
Well, Amos tells of just how severe the punishment will be because of their disobedience.
Much of what the prophets of Israel said was simply this telling God’s people how they had broken the Law he had given through Moses.
They weren’t singing his songs.
The Lord’s prophets also quoted earlier prophets to affirm that God’s people had been told other times as well.
The phrase Amos begins with, “The LORD roars from Zion and utters his voice from Jerusalem,” shows this.
These words are a quote from an earlier prophet - the prophet Joel.
And yet congregation, you couldn’t imagine a more inappropriate time to be bringing the kind of message Amos was bearing.
It was even less popular than preaching about sin and hell today!
It seems that the only thing supporting Amos was that his name meant “one who bears a burden.”
Because he was certainly carrying a burden if he was prophesying to these people about their destruction!
Even his contemporary prophet in the northern kingdom, Hosea, didn’t go on to this extent about the coming judgment.
Hosea’s prophecy spoke just as much about the love of God and the repentance which brings blessing.
Now, isn’t that a more positive message?
So, why were the words of Amos so out of key for the time?
To realise this we turn in the first aspect to considering … THE POLITICS IN THEIR SITUATION.
Well, economically it couldn’t have been better.
Indeed, it was a lot like the western world today.
Herman Veldkamp described it this way: “Never had the sun shone so brightly on the promised land as in the time of Jeroboam the Second and Uzziah (also called Azariah).
“Never did people sit so contentedly in the shade of the fig trees and vines as when Uzziah reigned over Jerusalem and Jeroboam, the son of Joash, reigned over Israel (i.e. about 750 B.C.).
“It was as though the golden age of Solomon had returned.
“The deplorable civil disputes of an earlier era had ended, and peace was restored within the land.
“Syria, Israel’s traditional enemy, had been completely conquered by Jeroboam … Jeroboam II was the most successful king Israel had ever had.
“Even Uzziah, who ruled in Judah, shared somewhat in his glory.
“It was a time of glittering prosperity, a great time to be alive.
“Business flourished, and people made lots of money.
“Many were wealthy enough to maintain both a winter home and a summer home and could even afford the luxury of costly ivory to adorn the walls of their homes and decorate the couches on which they lay to eat their meals (3:15 and 6:4).”
Not much different to nowadays - eh?
How many of us haven’t been blessed to have much more than what our parents had at this stage of their life?
What with our bigger houses - paid off a lot quicker too - the new furniture, nice cars, televisions, computers, electronic toys, microwaves, and the list goes on and on!
It’s not good is it?
I hope we would know the danger there is when we are doing so well materially.
Proverbs 30 contains a warning about being rich.
A man called Agur there in verses 8 and 9 asks God not give him riches, or, as he says, “Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’
Governments today may well talk about closing the gaps but when their wealth puts them on one side of the gap it’s a lot harder to see the real needs of the other side.
I’m not forgetting the millions and billions that Hollywood and Bill Gates put into charities.
But doesn’t that only show how much of a social difference there is?
And then they make such a big deal about it.
Everyone hears about how much money was raised or given.
Just like in the Israel of Amos when there were such huge voluntary offerings given. (4:5)
People can make their fortunes very quickly.
But pity those who are unfortunate enough to get caught in the way!
Then there are no rules.
“Greed is good,” shouts the central character in the movie, ‘Wall Street’.
He could just as well have cried, “Greed is God!”
In the time of Amos those people ignored the Law.
In fact, they had the Law in their hands - the bribery was that bad!
There was no justice.
In a short time the gaps were so big there was no middle class to bridge the gap.
There was the rich and the poor - and a lot more of the latter than the former!
And it was those poor who were literally sold out!
For only trivial reasons they were traded like chattels into slavery. (2:6)
This then brings us to the word of the LORD as it brings out their evil.
And Amos doesn’t hesitate to call it exactly what it is - sin!
So we come to the second aspect … THE PATTERN DESCRIBING THEIR TRANSGRESSION.
Now, the way that Amos brings it to his audience is an interesting literary device.
It is a method which has many similarities to much of public speaking through the ages.
By beginning with subjects which seem non-offensive and which everyone there would agree on quite definitely, the speaker draws in his audience.
By the time of its conclusion, though, the speaker leaves that audience in no doubt that this is the message for them right here and now!
So let’s consider this pattern.
I mean, we sure can’t ignore it!
It fairly screams out to us in these first two chapters.
With that relentless repetitious phrase “For three transgressions … and for four, I will not revoke the punishment,” we know that by the eighth time the LORD God is making his point.
The expression “for three … even for four…” is there to show that it’s more than the one sin.
In fact, the total number of sins doesn’t really matter here - what counts is that there are a number of them.
And not a few either.
I suppose then you would say one or two.
But three or four is much more!
As Martin Luther described it, this is ungodliness in its worst form.
So the measure of guiltiness is more than full.
It was almost as if he said, “Three would have been enough to warrant judgment - four makes it beyond question!”
Further evidence is seen for the multiplicity of their sin by the use of one example for each when three or four have been mentioned.
That particular sin each time is a most grievous crime.
And for the Lord to say that he won’t turn back his wrath shows how seriously he views what they have done.
Take that first one mentioned in verse 3, for example.
Now Damascus was the capital city of Syria.
And for Syria to thresh Gilead with sledges having iron teeth is to crush the prisoners to pieces under their harvesting machinery.
Those people, who were part of the Hebrews, are murdered in this horrible way.
And all in open view!
With probably their own equipment to boot!
You can’t tell me this is a civilisation.
There’s no height here.
This is the deepest depths of a barbaric nation!
But this is by no means the only example of terrible crime.
Look at verse 6.
The Philistines have captured Israelites and then, in turn, traded them off to the Edomites, the arch-enemy of Israel.
As if being defeated in the first place wasn’t bad enough - they were then completely humiliated by the treacherous Philistines.
Even worse, however, was the slave trading the Phoenicians did.
Verse 9 highlights this.
Like Syria and Philistia, the Phoenicians are named here by their capital city.
And it was probably through Tyre they also sold the Israelites as slaves to Edom.
But they had not captured them in battle in the first place.
In fact, Israel had never fought them in war - the Phoenicians had traded them from elsewhere.
In that they had broken the alliance they had made with David and Solomon.
This was all for greed.
Greed is not good!
Now these three nations - Syria, Philistia and Phoenicia - are all on the outer.
They were not directly related to God’s people.
In a way then we can expect their treachery - though they will be rightly punished for that!
Theirs are definitely crimes against humanity!
How about, though, those peoples who were actually related to the Hebrews?
Wouldn’t we anticipate a different behaviour from them?
In the list of Amos there first came Edom.
This we see in verse 11.
Edom, the descendants of Esau - Jacob’s brother.
But while Esau himself may have been reconciled with his brother, his nation did its utmost to get at Israel.
They continually opposed the Lord’s people - the place where blessing lay.
We already read that with the way she bought Israelite slaves from the outer nations around.
But then listen to this, “he pursued his brother with the sword and cast off all pity, and his anger tore perpetually, and he kept his wrath forever.”
Talk about an attitude problem!
Their whole being was set against their own!
Always had been - and always would be!
And Ammon was closely related too.
We come to them in verse 13.
They were the descendants of the son born through Lot’s incestuous union with his youngest daughter.
Lot - the nephew of Abraham, whom Abraham had even given the choice to which land he could take.
So how fond were their memories now?
It seems they were very short memories.
Their feelings towards their wider family become shown when during one war with the Israelites they cut open the pregnant women of Gilead.
Gilead seemed to get a lot of this barbarism from Israel’s enemies.
That was because of their location, which was on the eastern side of the Jordan.
They would always bear the brunt of any attack from the major powers of the north and the east.
Then there was Moab.
They were the descendants of the son born through Lot’s incestuous union with his oldest daughter.
Also a nation from whom you would expect some degree of empathy!
But this was the nation who hired Balaam to come and curse the Israelites as they were travelling through to the promised land.
When that didn’t work, they seduced them through their pagan sexual worship.
And throughout subsequent history they remained a thorn in the side of the Lord’s people.
Mind you, it’s interesting which crime they were accused of by Amos.
It is said in chapter 2 verse 1 that Moab “burned to lime the bones of the king of Edom.”
And what’s that got to do with Israel?
So far Amos has mentioned only crimes that were committed against the covenant nation.
Why this charge?
Well, it is most likely a reference to the war fought against the Moabites by Joram of Israel and Jehoshaphat of Judah, when they were united with the king of Edom.
It seems that after this war the Moabites dug up the bones of the king of Edom from the grave and heaped insults on them by burning them to ashes.
Now Amos comes to the nation of Judah.
The closest relative to Israel.
In fact the same covenant people, bar a division within the twelve tribes.
The circle is definitely tightening on Israel herself.
This is as close as you can get without actually hitting home!
In fact, by Amos announcing that the storm of God’s wrath will break out on Judah means that for sure it will strike Israel!
And which sin did the covenant nation of Judah do which is the worst sin?
Wouldn’t it be something cruel and utterly revolting?
A terrible treachery perhaps?
A treachery indeed!
The treachery against the very One who had made them what they were.
The One who had laid down all that they could be and should be, through his Law.
Judah had rejected the law of the Lord - they haven’t kept to his ways.
As chapter 2 verse 4 says, they have been led astray by false gods - the gods their ancestors followed.
Having outlined the case against each of Israel’s neighbours, Amos continues his pattern with the Lord’s judgment shown in … THE PICTURE OF THEIR DEVASTATION.
This is the third aspect to our text.
And devastating it certainly is for the judgment will come by fire burning up those nations and their cities.
There will be total destruction, along with the death or exile of all their peoples.
It will be the end of them.
Another prophetic contemporary of Amos, though in Judah, Isaiah, portrayed the ultimate disaster this was.
In chapter 66 verses 15 and 16 he declares, “See, the LORD is coming with fire, and his chariots are like a whirlwind; he will bring down his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire.
“For with fire and with his sword the LORD will execute judgment upon all men, and many will be slain by the LORD.”
The judgment alluded to after the flood, for the Lord said in Genesis 9:11 he would not punish the earth by that way of water again, is being used here as examples of what those outside of the Lord ultimately face.
At the end of Scripture, as we read in Revelation 20, it is the imagery of the fire burning forever which is used to describe God’s sentence on those who opposed him.
Fire is a fearsome thing.
It is something not to be caught by - for then the effects never leave you.
While it is a good servant, it makes a terrible master.
For the believer it becomes the good servant - it is a purifying device.
Symbolically it pictures the cleansing of the dross which holds us back from a purer following of the Lord’s way.
It is fire which reveals what we have done for the Lord.
If our service has been poor, we will be saved, even though it is the barest of escapes through the flames.
For the unbeliever it is the terrible master.
It completely takes you over - it means the end of everything.
And there is nothing which can keep them from that fire - it will swallow you up in its judgment.
Congregation, Amos has yet to come to the Lord’s Word upon Israel.
But the noose has tightened quite bit around their necks already - hasn’t it?
The Lord has condemned the outer nations who had dared go against the covenant nation.
It may be said that they should be excused because they didn’t know any better.
But they did.
Both in their own hearts, for there they have a sense of the divine and they know inherently a sense of right and wrong, and also because they knew the Hebrews were God’s people.
They had seen the blessing when Israel was faithful.
Those nations which were related certainly knew of that covenant.
At some point they had clearly rejected that, even though they had originally been a part of it.
Judah still paid lip-service to the covenant.
But that was all.
Many times in her history she had chased after the other gods.
Ever since the journey through the wilderness it had kept re-occurring in her history.
Just like she was doing now.
Congregation, there is a wide range of those who are to be punished by the Lord God.
There are those outrightly and perpetually pagan.
There are those who have left the Lord many years before, and who lived now like pagans.
And there are those whom you wouldn’t know were actually pagans.
But that’s what they really are, because in their hearts they had no time for the Lord or his Law at all!
At best church is a tradition.
They have always been part of it.
Perhaps not so consistently, but they would ever completely leave it either.
They will choose when, and how much, they’ll do with church.
But personal devotions - prayer and Bible?
Hey, now, don’t get too religious.
I’ve got my own life to live!
And that’s no life.
For them things are fine.
So don’t keep on going about that judgment stuff.
Keep it positive, up-beat - there’s a bit of good everywhere.
You wish!
My friend, if you think like that you’re not really thinking!
You’re dead on your feet!
And you’ve barely begun to hear what you’re really like.
Come next week!
Let’s see where you stand - or fall.
Amen.
PRAYER:
Let’s pray…
O Most Awesome God,
We have just begun to hear from Amos what judgment there is for those who go against you and your people.
These are terrible words.
And yet they are so true.
We must realise that without faith in Jesus Christ there is no life - only death.
A death which is an everlasting fire!
Lord, help us to deal with those around with such seriousness.
They must be saved.
Just as we ourselves have been barely plucked from the raging flames.
In the only Saviour’s Name, Jesus Christ, we pleadingly pray, Amen.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Rev. Sjirk Bajema, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
The source for this sermon was: www.rcnz.org.nz
(c) Copyright, Rev. Sjirk Bajema
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