Be Concerned - Amos - False Confidence

Amos 2:4. "Thus says the Lord, for three transgressions of Judah and for four, I will not turn away its punishment." Now, let's stop to think about what kind of response this would have elicited from his listeners. He was up in Israel when he was speaking, probably at Bethel. Amos 7 suggests that.

He was preaching to the people of Israel, and even though Israel and Judah were at peace politically, there were deep animosities between these two nations. And when he said for three transgressions of Judah and for four, I will not turn away its punishment. I can just hear the people in Israel at Bethel applauding. They started applauding and saying, "Amen! Hallelujah! Oh, judge Judah!"

We do that, don't we? It's always easy to be convicted about somebody else's sins. It's always easy to say, I hope God sends fire upon him, fire and brimstone upon him or her. No, but when it comes to us, that's another story, isn't it?

Now keep in mind that Amos was from Judah. He came from a little town called Tekoa. Tekoa means a camping place, just a little bump in the road. And here he was a dirt farmer with herds and flocks he took care of. He cultivated sycamore trees, just an everyday layman. And God called Amos. And Amos goes up to Israel, but he's also speaking to his own people and he says Judah is in for trouble.

Now, why? Because they have despised the law of the Lord and have not kept his commandments. Now keep in mind, he did not say this to the Gentiles, because God didn't give the Gentiles the law that he gave to the Jews. But you see to whom much is given, much shall be required. Someday we're going to give an accounting for what we have done with the word of God, we know.

You live in a nation where radio and television proclaim the word of God. You can buy a Bible in a supermarket. They'll give you one free if you go down to the rescue mission. And we have all of these privileges and all of these opportunities and we're going to have a lot of responsibility. We're going to have a lot of accountability. And that's what he's saying to Judah. They despised the word of the Lord.

2 Chronicles 36 tells us what happened to them. And the Lord God of their fathers sent warnings to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending them, because he had compassion on his people and on his dwelling place, meaning of course, the temple. But they mocked the messengers of God, despised his words, scoffed at his prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against his people till there was no remedy. And what happened? Well, the Babylonians came down and wiped out Jerusalem and destroyed the temple and took the people captive. Why? Because they despised the word of the Lord and did not keep his commandments.

Now, the word of God was given to the people, the law was given to the people as a gift of God's blessing. The law was not given as a prison. No, the law was given as a gift of God's blessing, to keep Israel from being defiled and polluted and corrupted by the nations around them. To enable Israel to worship the true God, to enjoy the blessings of their land. And then one day to bring the Messiah, the Savior into the world. Oh, it was serious, this matter of the law.

Moses said to them in Deuteronomy 30:15, "See, I've set before you today life and good, death and evil. In that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways, to keep his commandments, his statutes, his judgments, that you may live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you go to possess." The law was not given as a burden. It was given to bring them blessing.

Now we aren't saved by keeping the law, we know that. But oh, if they obeyed the word of God, he would bless them and their flocks and herds would increase, and their and their land would produce great harvests and their children would grow up strong and there wouldn't be wars and plagues and famines and droughts. But alas, they didn't do that, did they? Alas, they disobeyed the word of the Lord.

The book of Deuteronomy 32 and Moses says this in verse 46, "Set your hearts on all the words which I testify among you today, which you shall command your children to be careful to observe all the words of this law. For it is not a futile thing for you, because it is your life. And by this word you shall prolong your days in the land which you cross over the Jordan to possess." They're entering the land was the gift of God. Their enjoying the land had to do with what they did with God's word.

The law was a wall that separated them from the polluted Gentile nations around them. The law was to give them guidance. Proverbs 6:23, "For the commandment is a lamp and the law is light, reproofs of instruction are the way of life." It keeps us from sin. It guides us. Well, they did not honor the word of God. They despised the law. They did not treat it with respect and honor, and then they disobeyed the law.

How did they disobey the law? Well, we are told here in verse 4, their lies lead them astray. Lies after which their fathers walked. Now what does he mean by their lies? Does it mean they were telling lies? No, they were living a lie, false gods. That little phrase lead them astray.

Their lies lead them astray. The Hebrew word that pictures a lost animal just wandering around, not knowing where to go. It's also the picture of a drunk who is staggering around wondering where to find the door, where to find home. He said these people were given the law.

Now the law protected them, the law directed them, the law could have given them life and blessing and shown them the way. What did they do? They turned to idols, lies, false gods.

Solomon led the way in all of this. You remember that? It was King Solomon who turned away from the truth of the word of God and began to practice idolatry. You find this in 1 Kings 11. He loved many strange women. Solomon really got off track because of strange women, that is, women from outside of Israel.

He got off because of wealth. All the wisdom he had, you'd think he would have been smart enough to know you can't worship idols and get away with it. Well, he tried and he began to worship the false gods and before long, the people went the same way. The leaders lead people the wrong way. And the nation of Judah began to worship idols.

Now they didn't throw Jehovah out. That's the insidious thing about it. They put Jehovah in the temple, but they put Baal in the temple and they put all the other gods in the temple right along with him. They said, "We're going to be very tolerant. We're going to be very tolerant of our neighbors. We know our neighbors have a different religion from us. Now, who are we to say they are wrong and we are right?"

Well, they forgot that their faith came from God. God had given to them the word. God had given to them the truth. And they said, "Let's just simply worship God along with Baal and along with these other false gods." And God said, "No, nobody stands with me. I'm alone. I'm unique. There is no other God. I am the Lord your God. There is no other God beside me. You shall worship the Lord your God. Him only shall you serve. You shall not make any graven images because I am the only living and true God."

They said, "Well, that was all right for Moses' day, but, you know, we're more enlightened today. We don't have to think about those things. We've studied comparative religion and we realize that you can be more tolerant of some of these things."

And before long, they were not only worshiping false gods, but they were living the way the Gentiles lived. They were involved in idolatry, in immorality. And God said, "You keep this up, I'll have to deal with you. I will send a fire upon Judah. It shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem." And that is what happened.

In 606, the Babylonians began to swoop down upon Judah. "Oh, it can't happen to us. We're the people of God. This is God's temple. We are God's people. Here's the priesthood, here's the covenant." Makes no difference. You can have all of those things if you don't have a heart that's right with God. He's going to have to judge. God will not allow his people to sin successfully.

And God sent the Babylonians and they destroyed Jerusalem. They killed a lot of people and they deported thousands of people off to Babylon. And that great nation that had known the blessing of God was lying there in the dust.

Read the book of Lamentations and weep with Jeremiah and see what happens when you tolerate sin. Judah was going to be judged and Judah was judged. Before we criticize them too much, let's ask the question, Lord, are we next?

The prophet Amos is up at Bethel. This is where the king had his special chapel. And everybody rejoiced because Jeroboam the Second was such a religious man. But actually, the religion in Israel was just a facade, it was shallow, it was not real. People were going through the motions. They were singing and going to concerts and they were going with their sacrifices.

And so God took Amos of Judah and sent him up to Israel and sent him, this ordinary farmer, herdsman, right into the king's chapel and he's preaching the word of God.

Now, while he was announcing judgment for the Gentile nations, the congregation was quite pleased. Amos started in Amos 1:3 and he judged the Syrians and then the Philistines and then the people of Tyre and Edom, Ammon and Moab, even Judah. The people must have looked at each other and said, "My, didn't Amos come from Tekoa down there in Judah?" And here he is condemning his own nation.

Well, this doesn't mean that Amos was not a good patriot. He loved his nation and that's why he pointed out the sin. But in Amos 2:6, when Amos the prophet started on Israel, that was a different story.

What does he do in Amos 2:6-16? Well, he presents Israel's sinful present in verses 6, 7 and 8. Their glorious past in verses 9 through 12, and their terrible future in 13 through 16. He deals with the present, the past, and the future.

Let's look at the present. Amos 2:6, "Thus says the Lord for three transgressions of Israel and for four, I will not turn away its punishment." Now he begins to list the sins of which they were guilty. Because they sell the righteous for silver and the poor for a pair of sandals.

He's talking here about their injustice. They are taking bribes that the poor and the innocent might be found guilty. In other words, they want to buy themselves a pair of sandals, they need a new pair of shoes, they want some silver. And so here we have crooked lawyers, crooked judges, crooked officials in the government who are taking bribes to hurt the poor.

By the way, it's interesting to see how much Amos has to say about this sin of exploiting the poor. Amos 4:1. "Hear this word, you cows of Bashan," he's talking to the women, "who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy."

Here are the women saying to their husbands, "Make more money. Get all you can out of those poor people so we can have more wine and more drink." Amos 5:11. "Therefore, because you tread down the poor and take grain taxes from him." For what purpose? "Though you have built houses of hewn stone." Robbing the poor to build their own houses.

Amos 8:6. "That we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, even sell the bad wheat." They're selling all the poor products to the poor and then they're taking money that hurts the poor. Verse 6 of Amos 8 parallels, doesn't it, Amos 2:6. Throughout the book of Amos, the prophet is crying out against their treatment of the poor.

Now he knew that the Old Testament law commanded them to care for the poor. Deuteronomy 15:7. "If there is among you a poor man of your brethren within any of the gates in your land which the Lord your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart nor shut your hand from your poor brother. But you shall open your hand wide to him and willingly lend him sufficient for his need, whatever he needs."

He's talking here about specific regulations of the land and the harvest, but the principle applies to all of us, doesn't it? We don't have to be under Old Covenant law to know we should love the poor and we should not allow them to be exploited.

Exodus 23:6. "You shall not pervert the judgment of your poor in his dispute. Keep yourself far from a false matter. Do not kill the innocent and righteous, for I will not justify the wicked, and you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the discerning and perverts the words of the righteous." It goes on to say you should not cause trouble and oppress the stranger.

In the book of Proverbs, Solomon had a good deal to say about caring for the poor. Proverbs 14:31, "He who oppresses the poor reproaches his maker. But he who honors him has mercy on the needy." Proverbs is a book that talks a great deal about being kind and helpful to those who are needy. Proverbs 17:5, "He who mocks the poor reproaches his maker. He who is glad at calamity will not go unpunished." Their injustice.

It gets worse now. Amos 2:7. "They pant after the dust of the earth, which is on the head of the poor, and pervert the way of the humble." That word pant after can be translated trample. They trample the poor into the dust. And they are trying to get everything they can out of the poor.

"A man and his father go into the same girl to defile my holy name." Well, they had immorality back in those days. This is probably some form of incest to think that a father would be such a bad example to his son, or a son would be so arrogant in his sin that he take his father along with him. How low can we get when whole families dedicate themselves to sin? What a bad example, what a terrible, terrible defilement of God's holy name. Injustice and immorality.

And then he also talks about idolatry. They lie down by every altar on clothes taken in pledge. Let's stop right there. Every altar. There was only one altar that God accepted. That was the altar in the temple at Jerusalem.

Alas, Israel did not go down there. They went to Bethel, Dan. They went to other places to worship at altars all over the place. Why? Because they were worshiping Jehovah God plus the gods of the heathen. They were not doing what God wanted them to do. And they were sinning at the altar.

They drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their God. They take money in the court from people who ought to be set free. They take money, bribery. Then they go get drunk and go to the heathen altar to visit a prostitute. Now, how much sin can you put together in one place with one person? Oh, you say it's not going on today. Worse than that is going on today.

They keep the garments of the poor people taken in pledge. Now they aren't supposed to do that. According to the Old Covenant law in Exodus 22:26 and Deuteronomy 24, when you took a garment for a pledge, you were supposed to give it back at sundown because the poor man needed his garment for his sleeping. And then next day you could pick up that garment again.

God was very careful in the way he assigned the laws in taking care of the poor. Injustice, immorality, idolatry, all wrapped up with drunkenness. And this is done at the altar. Their religion was polluted, their sinful present.

Now having exposed their sinful present, in spite of all their religion and all of the buildings that they had and the prosperity, he then turns to their glorious past. You know, one of the best ways to get under conviction and repent is just to stop and think of how good God's been to you. It's the goodness of God that leads us to repentance.

That's what woke up the prodigal son. While he was out there feeding the pigs and hungry, he said, "How many of my father's hired servants have bread enough and to spare? Here I am his son. If the hired servants are well taken care of, certainly the children are well taken care of. My father's a generous man. I'm going home." And so the prophet Amos says, "You have forgotten how good God has been to you." He reviews here the history of Israel.

Now Amos may have been an ordinary layman. He did not attend the schools of the prophets. He was not especially a part of that group, but he was God's called prophet. He may have been a layman, but he knew his Bible. I thank God for laymen, lay women in our churches who know their Bibles. In fact, I have met people in churches who know far more about the Bible than those who have been off to school.

Again, I'm not condemning education. I have taught at two different schools and I have been a part of lecturing at schools. I'm in favor of education. I thank God for the training he enabled me to get. But when God wants to, he can call somebody who's never been to those schools, doesn't even know their names. And he can use that person for his glory, so he did with Amos.