Year 3, Day 232: Obadiah

A Whole Book in a Day

Obadiah is a neat book in that it is only 1 chapter long.  So we will start it and finish it in a day.  For the record, in just over a week we’ll read both 2 John and 3 John in the same day.  And earlier in the year (February) you’ll remember reading the book of Philemon all in one day, too.  Banner year!  While I jest, I do think it is neat to say today that you read an entire book of the Bible in a day.

History

Obadiah is written after the fall of Jerusalem.  The Babylonians had taken Jerusalem and the Hebrew people of Judah were fleeing for their lives.  While this was happening, the Edomites went around and rounded up these refugees and turned them over to Babylon.  The point of Obadiah is that the Edomites (people of Esau) should be treating their kin (people of Jacob) better than this.  Obadiah will tell Edom that God will repay their desire to take advantage of the fall of the Hebrew people.

The Sin of Edom

Edom’s greatest sin is in their pride.  They know where they live.  They know that the mountain and hill country in which they live is difficult terrain.  They believe that their natural circumstances will protect them.  They are proud in their supposed security.

However, Obadiah reminds them that there are more ways to be conquered than through the military oppression of the Babylonians.  Thieves can come in and steal away that which is precious.  “Harvesters” {slavers} can come in and take away their fruit {population}.  No, they will be pillaged.

None of this talks about the ultimate truth, which is that God can reach them wherever they are.  God is not fearful of the hazardous terrain in which they live.  Even if their home was among the stars, God could bring them down.  In their pride, they have committed the same fault as the people of the Tower of Babel.  They believed themselves to be unstoppable and they have forgotten about the supremacy of God.  They believed themselves unreachable and have forgotten about the power of the Most High.  Like the tower of Babel, Edom will be torn down and the people scattered around the world. 

Shame of Edom

When the Babylonians finally conquered Judah the Edomites lined up to look what they could plunder.  They allied themselves with Babylon and cut off the way of the fugitives.  They gloated over the fall of their neighbors.

Of course they did all of this because they were thinking about themselves.  In that end, can I blame them?  When I see someone stepping out of line and about to get nailed, don’t I get right in line with authority and try to use their disobedience as evidence of my superior obedience?  Am I never guilty of using someone else’s downfall to elevate my position and make people less likely to come after me next?  Of course I am.  That’s just what it means to be a flawed human being.

God’s point is that the Edomites shouldn’t be doing it.  They shouldn’t be kicking the Hebrew people when they are down.  They shouldn’t be allying themselves with the enemy just to save their own neck.  They shouldn’t be looking out for themselves.  They need to repent rather than continue in the errant behavior.

Judgment Shall Come

I was watching a movie this past weekend and one of the characters made an incredibly interesting point.  We never hear anything modern about an Edomite, a Philistine, a Phoenician, an Aramian, a Chaldeans, a Babylonian, an Assyrian, etc.  For example, nobody is walking around claiming to be Babylonian in heritage.  They are just gone.  Yes, they existed.  Yes, they left archaeological evidence as proof of their existence.  But they are no more.

They were wiped from the face of the planet.  They were absorbed seamlessly into other cultures.  Their nationality was simply lost and merged with some other nation of the day.

Yet, this isn’t true about the Hebrew people.  Even though they were brought under captivity by nations who have been lost, the Hebrew people have not been lost.  We still know who the Jewish people are and can even point to modern Jews!

This is evidence of the judgment that Obadiah proclaims here to the Edomites.  Because of their refusal to be humble and repent, they shall be consumed.  Unlike the Hebrew people – who will have a remnant – the Edomites will be no longer.  They will become a part of someone else and their culture will be absorbed and destroyed.

Return of the Lord’s People

This is where Obadiah leaves off the prophecy against Edom.  God wants Edom to hear their judgment and destruction and then hear how the Hebrew people will continue.  God’s people may have years of captivity under the world ahead of them, but a faithful remnant will persevere.  Faithful people will always persevere because God is bigger than this world.

But when we live for the world, we will simply be absorbed into the world as the world changes around us.  When the things I live for are destroyed or consumed by the world, I am absorbed into the world and lost.  But when I live for God, He is able to retain me and keep me.  It is God that is the difference between the ancient Hebrew people and the ancient nations around them that have simply melded into the course of history.

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Year 3, Day 231: Amos 9

Destruction

In this last chapter of Amos, we start with a prophecy of destruction.  Amos sees the Lord standing at His altar.  But He is not here to embrace it.  Nor is He here to accept the offerings.  Instead, the Lord is here ready to destroy the altar.

I can’t help but pause here for a moment.  What does God think of religious practices that are not sincere?  I know I’ve made this point many times this year as we’ve dived into the Major and Minor Prophets.  This is one of the major points of these books.  Just because we say a space is holy or consecrated doesn’t mean that God sees it the same way.  The name and designation that we give to a space is nothing when compared to the manner in which we use the space.  A space is not holy because we say it is.  A space is holy because the things of God happen there.

So we return to Amos.  The altar that Amos envisions is to be destroyed.  In the vision, God tells Amos to smash the top (capitals) until the threshold shakes.  He wants to bring the temple down upon the heads of the people!  {I’m having a serious flashback to a Solomon-in-the-midst-of-the-Philistines moment.}  To those who escape, God commands that they be killed with the sword.  Judgment is quick and thorough when it does eventually come from the Lord.  This is historically true.  Once the Assyrians come, they don’t take long in overtaking Israel and swallowing them into captivity.

Furthermore, there is no escape from God.  Who can dig deeper than God can reach?  Who can rise above God’s reach?  Who can hide where God cannot find them?  When God determines something to happen to us, which of us has the power to avoid it?  It is best to repent now while the offer is on the table than when the inevitability of God’s judgment is upon us.

Who is this God?

I love the middle section of this last chapter.  Just in case the Hebrew people think that they can escape the grip of God, Amos is mindful of whom it is that is speaking.  God touches the earth and it melts.  The whole land undulates like the Nile at the presence of the Lord.  The Lord builds into the heavens and into the deep.  The Lord calls upon the water and it rains.  This is God.

And who are the Hebrew people?  They are slaves that God brought out of Egypt.  They were nothing until God showed interest in them.  They were oppressed and unable to save themselves.  They were no different than the Philistines until the Lord gave His Word to them.  So when they reject His Word, why shouldn’t they be destroyed and sent into captivity.  If they scorn that very thing that makes them different than the world, why shouldn’t they be treated as the world?

This is a powerful section because of the truth it can speak into our lives as a people.  What has God given to us?  What hasn’t God given to us?  What incredible blessings God has laid upon our lives!  God has called us to a different life – a holy life.  As I finish Amos, I find myself asking how it is that I will respond to the generosity of God.

Restoration

Amos really does end well.  He moves quickly from judgment to wrath to restoration.  In reality for the Hebrew people of Israel, the space between verses 10 and 11 is roughly 200 years.  But the point is not how long it takes people to get there.  The point is that the people will get there.  There will be a remnant.  There will be a time when God’s people rebuild.  There will be faithful ones.

I know what I’m thinking in the back of my mind.  In looking to the future, I’m skipping over 200 years of unfaithfulness.  It’s like looking to the Hebrew people who were wandering through the wilderness after the exodus and were just waiting to die so the faithful generation could enter the Promised Land.  Yes, there will be a time – even generations – of unfaithfulness.  But Amos’ promise is that one day the land will be restored.

I love this analogy into our life as well.  Yes, there are going to be seasons in our life where faithfulness just doesn’t seem to be happening around us.  There will be times when we are dealing with sin – either our own or other peoples.  There will be times when we’ll feel like we’re in captivity.

But there will be restoration.  One day, God will remake this life.  He will create a new heaven and a new earth that is free from the corruption of human sinfulness.  And that day, all of the struggles of this age will be worth it – for we shall dwell with God, in His land, as He intends it.

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Year 3, Day 230: Amos 8

Summer Fruit

I think it is unfortunate that many translations give this explanation as to what Amos sees as chapter 8 opens.  When I hear “summer fruit” I think of cherries, plums, peaches, and melons.  But that isn’t quite what God has shown Amos.  God shows Amos “ripe fruit.”  In other words, fruit that has been picked after it has been allowed to ripen on the tree.  Not “summer fruit” but fruit “picked in summer.”  Amos would know this; he is, after all, a dresser of sycamore fig trees.

Why is this important?  When fruit is picked after being allowed to ripen on the tree it has an amazingly short shelf life.  When melons or peaches are ripe, they need to be eaten or they will decay surprisingly quickly.  The same thing is true for any fruit – or vegetable, for that matter.  {Keep in mind that this is an age prior to refrigeration technology.}

So here is what God says to Amos.  Israel is like a basket of fruit picked in summer.  They are ripe right now, but they will very quickly enter into the stage of being rotten.  The time for the harvest is now, because soon there won’t be anything left worth harvesting.  Israel is now in their prime; the time was coming quickly when these elite would be killed and strewn across the land at the hand of the Assyrians.

Call to the Unfaithful

In verses 4-6 we see God speaking to the people of business in the land.  Tell me if this sounds familiar.  The business people were crying out when the religious festivals and holy times would be over because they just wanted to get back to making money.  Behold: the power of the Almighty Silver!  Or is it the Almighty Gold?  Or is it the Almighty Dollar?

You see, the people in Amos’ day were all about economy.  It was all about profit.  It was all about doing whatever they could to separate people from their silver so that the silver could be in their pocket instead.  Economy reigned supreme in Israel right before they fell into spiritual and physical captivity.  I think God’s point is fairly clear.  Yes, making a living is okay – in fact, part of godly living.  But there is more to life than economy and making money – especially if it is done at the expense of others.  When we are willing to make money by trampling on the backs of others, God does not approve.

Judgment

Having described the reality, Amos now describes the reality of the Lord.  Listen to the words used.  “I will never forget any of their deeds.”  Yes, God takes sin pretty seriously.

The price of sin is mourning.  Here’s the funny part of it.  Most of the time, God doesn’t even have to do anything.  He simply has to watch as the consequences of our sinfulness overtake us.  He just has to watch as we do it to ourselves.  The greed of one person turns into the greed and vengeance of another person and soon the whole system is out of whack as we are all trying to get the better of each other.

We truly make our lives bitter by our sinfulness.  It is not God who makes our lives bitter; it is we who do it to ourselves.  God simply stands beside us and calls us out of that bitterness.  Sometimes His call is pleasant (the call to repent from the prophets).  Sometimes His call is unpleasant (captivity under Assyria/Babylon).  But rest assured, it is we who make our lives bitter.

Silence

True punishment from God is His silence.  Think about it.  What fate in life could ever be greater than God ignoring us?  What fate in life could be worse than knowing that not only do I have the consequences of my sin but the unbridled consequences of everyone else’s sin, too!

God claims that there is a day of famine coming to the Hebrew people.  It is a famine not of bread or water but of word from the Lord.  There is a famine coming when the Hebrew people will only have human reasoning to rely upon.  Now that’s a scary thought indeed!  Can you imagine what life would be like if the only thing we had to rely upon was our own reasoning?

That is the punishment we deserve when we ignore the words of the Lord.  When we say to the Lord, “We aren’t interested in listening,” we deserve to hear Him say, “Very well, then I shall stop talking.”  Again, it isn’t the Lord who brings it upon us.  It is we who bring it upon ourselves!

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Year 3, Day 229: Amos 7

Locust and Fire

The locust plague was one of the worst plagues that could set upon a community in the ancient world.  Truth be told, it isn’t looked upon much more highly in our modern world, either!  Here’s the problem with locusts: they eat the crops.  That might sound simple, but it’s really more complex.  Without crops, hunger sets in.  Immune systems diminish.  People are weak and they get sick.  Some die.  Now you have a weakened community not only fighting off illness and disease but also struggling against pollution coming from dead and decaying bodies.  Famine, pestilence, and disease are all natural consequences when the locusts come.

In that perspective, take seriously the opening words on this chapter.  The Lord formed the locust plague Himself.  This was an intentional act.  But look to when the Lord formed the plague.  It came after the first growth.

Let’s look at why this is important.  You see, the first growth was the king’s share.  So the fields were gleaned and all of it was given to the king.  When the second growth came, it was for all the people.  It was this gleaning that the locusts from the Lord would strip bare.

Amos cried out to the Lord that He might relent, and the Lord did!  That’s the amazing part of this scripture.  This is the only time that Amos asks the Lord to forgive.  And the Lord relents.  In fact, the Lord doesn’t just relent with the locusts but also with the sweeping destructive fire as well!  The judgment of the people will still come, but not in such a horrific time as a locust swarm.

What does this teach us?  First, the Lord is merciful.  Is He just in His judgment?  Absolutely.  Does the Lord know that it would have brought incredible suffering and thus is merciful when asked to be merciful?  Absolutely.  Second, it teaches us the power of a faithful witness.  God doesn’t have to listen, but He does listen to the faithful.  He doesn’t have to relent, but He does relent when Amos asks.  Yes, there is judgment to come that the people of Israel will not escape.  But the prayers of the faithful make that judgment as palatable as possible.

In fact, that is actually the point of the following vision of the plumb line.  You see, God had built the nation “true to plumb.”  The Law and the covenants had been plumb.  God even sent prophets among the Hebrew people to help them regain plumb when they got out of sort.  But now they are beyond repair.  God is making the point to Amos that the people need to be judged.  Perhaps the locusts and the devouring fire would be too much.  But a people this out of plumb would need to find consequences or else they would continue to go askew.

Thankfulness of the Ruling Elite

I’m going to speak a bit from the omniscient point of view.  We know that the Hebrew people were living licentiously in the midst of the desires of their hearts.  They chose wrong over right.  They chose oppression over justice.  They chose themselves over the poor.  That was absolutely their choice.

However, we also know that this upset God.  So God sent the prophets to try and talk sense into the people.  In Israel, the rulers did not listen.  That’s where we pick up the second half of Amos 7.

Amaziah, a priest at Bethel, went to the king and told him what Amos is saying.  Of course, the priest isn’t willing to listen to Amos.  This implies that the king isn’t willing to listen to Amos, either.  They don’t like the fact that Amos is denouncing their lifestyle and they like even less that he is predicting their destruction.  So, they do what people in power do when opposed.  They get rid of the opposition.  They tell Amos to leave as he is no longer welcome.

This is where the story gets good.  Amos looks to them and tells them that he was just a shepherd when all this started.  He wasn’t a professional prophet.  He was out tending his flocks and his trees when the Lord called him to leave his hometown and come give this message.  Amos explains to them that God was doing them a favor by sending a warning into their midst.  So if they desire to ignore the warning, then they will face judgment.

How’s that for a response to the guy who just single-handedly saved the country from plagues of locusts and fire?  Rather than a thank-you, he gets shoved out the door.  Unfortunately, this is often – though not always – the case with people in charge.  When they are confronted with their sinfulness they don’t want to hear it.  So they use their power to get rid of the very people sent to help them.  My prayer is that we are all smart enough to realize help when it comes from the Lord.

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Year 3, Day 228: Amos 6

Woe to Those at Ease

These first seven verses really hit home with me today.  Here I am in America, living in a comfortable life.  I’m lying on an airbed with plenty of blankets and sheets to keep me warm and clean.  I have running water.  I have indoor plumbing and a water facility that keeps my water clean.  I have more clothes than I could wear in two weeks.  I’m not fearing death by Malaria, Smallpox, Menangitis, Dengue Fever, or anything else.  {Although truth be told there were a few weeks of reoccurring illness when I came back from Honduras that made me begin to legitimately fear having contracted Malaria.}

So here I am in my air-conditioned house having eaten a salad for lunch made from food of which I had no part in its growing or raising or baking.  I am feeling very American.  {How’s that for a definition of what it means to be an American?}

What do I read here in Amos?  Woe to you who are at ease.  Woe to you who lie on beds of ivory {no, mine is not made of ivory.  But it is made of air!}  I begin to wonder.  How different am I than those fat cats in Israel with whom God got really irritated?  Yes, I know that being rich is not a sin.  But being rich in a system that oppresses the poor of the world just might cause me to orbit too close to the “guilty” side of the equation for comfort’s sake.

As a point, let me introduce you to a very fascinating world clock.  It can be found at www.poodwaddle.com.  {You can just click that, it is a link...}  You can do all sorts of neat things.  One of the coolest things you can do is hit the “now” button.  It will keep track of everything that it keeps track of from when you hit that “now” button.  For the record, I hit it as I began to write this post.  Since I’ve started writing this post, 26 people have died from Malaria in the world.  59 people have died from HIV/AIDS related complications.  123 people have died from respiratory illnesses.  64 people have died from diarrheal diseases.  Yeah.  I’m still here.  Fat cat sitting on an air bed typing into a computer.

“Therefore, they shall now be the first of those who go into exile.”  Verse 7 cuts me pretty deeply – right where I deserve to be cut.  I’m not saying God is looking at my opulence and condemning me for it.  I’m wondering if God is condemning me because I continue to sit here regardless of the state of my wealth.  Why do those who live at ease find it so difficult to get motivated to do something about those who struggle to grasp onto life each and every day?  Why does the third world continue to exist when the first world lives in such luxury?  Yes, I know I am over-simplifying.  Wealth is not the answer to poverty.  Education is.  Sometimes places in the world don’t want to hear truth, so they continue in their current existence.  I don’t mean to too grossly oversimplify.

What does God say?  He abhors the pride of Jacob.  He hates his strongholds.  Those are pretty strong words.  I wonder how much my lifestyle gives me a pride God abhors?  How many strongholds do I have in my life that God hates?

Wormwood

As we look at the back half of this chapter, I can’t help but listen hard at the analogies that we hear.  Justice into poison.  Fruit into wormwood (poison).  What should result in a life of righteousness is turned into a life of horrible self-centeredness.

I know what you are thinking.  Is it my fault for being born in America?  No.  But look around.  What is it that we as Americans have begun to fight over?  Celebrities and their rights.  Athletes and their pay.  Paparazzi and their invasiveness.  Government officials and their fat lifestyle.  How much in bed together our government and health insurance agencies happen to be.  The gasoline efficiency of my car.  Whether I slap a donkey or an elephant onto my Facebook page every 4 years.

I have to ask myself, what is any of that next to malaria?  What have I faced that can even touch the locust devastation brought on recently in Madagascar?  I should turn this wonderful near-utopia into which I was born into a blessing upon the world.  {I’m not saying we don’t have our problems, but when compared with the crises of the rest of the world, we do have a pretty tame life in America.}  But what do I do?  Complain that I can’t find a ripe avocado in a grocery store to save my life!  Really?  Is that to what my life has come?  If that is the worst thing in my life with which I must deal, I think God has every right to look down upon me and wonder.

Just for the record, this blog post took a little less time to write than I thought.  Normally my blog posts here take 45-60 minutes.  Today’s post only took me a bit over 30 minutes.  But I want to return to the world clock.  Here’s what has happened in the now 35 minutes of typing:

Deaths: 2,895 by abortion.  261 by respiratory infections.  217 from perinatal conditions.  134 by diarrheal diseases.  127 by AIDS/HIV complications.  92 from tuberculosis.  56 from Malaria.  54 from Childhood Cluster diseases {pertussis, poliomyelitis, diphtheria, measles, and tetanus}.  22 from Meningitis.  17 from Protein Malnutrition.  10 from tropical diseases.  10 from Iron Deficiency Anemia.  8 from STDs.  7 from Hepatitis B.  4 from Hepatitis C.  1 from Dengue Fever.

Other stats: $2,293,576 made in drug trade revenue.  {In 35 minutes, are you kidding me?}  1,471 thefts.  495 burglaries.  308 assaults.  86 divorces.  34 acts of non-assault/non-rape sexual violence. 32 homicides.  21 rapes.  11 sexual offenses against minors.

How long will I be content living under “my own strength?”  How long will I live in comfort because of what “I have made for myself?”  When will I start to be appreciative of what God has given to me in such a lavish blessing and begin to focus on pouring out of God’s generosity into the lives of others?  How much of this world can I change while lying in comfort upon my bed of “ivory?”

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Year 3, Day 227: Amos 5

Chiasm

A chiasm is a linguistic style of structuring an argument.  Essentially, you list your points with an increasingly narrow perspective until you get to the heart of the conversation.  Then, you list your points in reverse order.  Essentially, it looks like this: A, B, C, D, E, D, C, B, A.  Of course, you can have as many or as few points as necessary for the argument to be complete.  What chiasms allow orators and speech writers to do is to go from the broad to the specific in order to find the “root.”  Once the “root” is found, they can then go back to the broad point to show relationship to the root.  {If you think back to the study of Lamentations we did a few months ago you will see that the whole book of Lamentations is one big chiasm!}

In the first 17 verses of Amos 5 we have a chiasm.  Here is the pattern: Description of Judgment, Call for Individual Repentance, Accusation of Legal Injustice, Portrayal of a Sovereign God, Accusation of a Legal Injustice, Call for Individual Repentance, and Description of Judgment.  Amos goes through this pattern to make a point about judgment and how judgment is deserved from a sovereign God.

Flow of the Chiasm

Verses 2-3 make up the description of judgment.  Israel will fall.  In Biblical poetry, it is proper to assume the words “by the sword” after hearing the word “fallen.”  It is simply a linguistic assumption the reader is allowed to make.  Israel will fall by the sword of the Assyrians.  In fact, they will fall so horribly that only a tenth of their soldiers will survive the Assyrian onslaught.  It makes me wonder if this means that the only time God’s judgment gets our attention is when it comes through a violence that leads to captivity.  If so, oh how we are to be pitied as people.

Verses 4-6 make up the call for repentance.  Notice the famous call: seek the Lord and live!  However, also notice that Amos tells us to not seek the Lord at Bethel or Gilgal.  We cannot seek the Lord through some nationalistic movement.  We don’t ride into God’s presence on the coattails of others.  No, we are to each seek the Lord.  Yes, we can seek the Lord together, but we must each actively participate in seeking the Lord.  Repentance is first and foremost a movement begun in the heart of the individual.

Verse 7 is the accusation.  The people have scorned righteousness and justice.  They have cast them off.  In their greed, they have turned instead to “bitterness” or “wormwood.”  They have adopted societal poison instead of drinking from the living waters of righteousness.

Verses 8-9 compose the middle of the chiasm.  In here we find a description of the sovereign God.  He made the heavens.  He knows the deep.  He turns darkness to night.  He brings the rain.  He is also the one in charge of destruction.

Verses 10-13 bring us back to legal accusation.  In the face of this sovereign God the people act deceitfully.  They extort.  They ignore the ones who reprove.  They abhor truth-speakers.  They trample over the poor.  They take bribes.  They turn their back upon the needy.  They have no regard for the sovereign Lord or His ways for living.  But God knows their sinfulness and will take matters into His hands.

Verses 14-15 bring us back to the call for individual repentance.  Again notice the call to seek the Lord and live.  Note how the call is to the individual once more.  But now we hear specifically what repentance looks like.  Hate evil.  Love good.  Establish justice.  Repentance is not just a feeling; it is a changed life.

Verses 16-17 bring us all the way back to the beginning as we end on a description of judgment.  The people will wail.  There is a call for repentance, but most do not heed it.  They will enter into judgment blind with respect to God’s grace.  Instead of repenting and finding grace, their stubborn clutch upon their sin plunges them headlong into judgment.  Rather than turn to the sovereign God, they continue to turn away.

Let Justice Roll

I love this passage of Amos.  The day of a Lord is like a man who fled a lion and met a bear.  It is like a man who goes into his house and gets bit by a serpent.  There is no safety on the day of Lord.  Judgment will come upon all.

This speaks volume into today’s culture.  How many people today clamor for the Day of the Lord?  How many people today earnestly pray for Christ’s return?  That is a short-sighted prayer.  Yes, it will be great to dwell with God eternally.  That will be awesome.  But the transition from this existence to the next will be difficult.  There will be judgment upon the living in the form of geologic distress, pestilence, famine, hunger, violence, etc.  There will then be judgment for all of us before the judgment seat of God.  That will be a judgment that only a few of us will escape barely via the blood of Christ.  It will be a dark and difficult day.  Sure, eternity will be bliss.  But the Day of the Lord?  Dark and foreboding.

No, rather than praying for the coming of the Day of the Lord we should work towards righteousness now.  The Day of the Lord will come soon enough; we have a job to accomplish.  We are to be about justice and righteousness.  Letting it roll down from heaven.  Living a life so that God finds us pleasing and not detestable as He found the sacrifices of old.

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Year 3, Day 226: Amos 4

Cows of Bashan

I still remember studying this verse in seminary.  You just don’t forget an analogy like this.  It is one of my favorite analogies in the whole of the Old Testament.

Let’s look at what Amos is trying to say through this analogy.  First of all, notice that he is specifically talking to women because in the end of verse 1 he speaks of their “husbands.”  So Amos is addressing the women of Israel here.

Second, he is talking about the rich women.  In fact, he is talking to rich women who have such expensive tastes that the only way for their obsequious husbands to please them is to crush the poor under oppression.  That’s the audience to whom Amos is speaking.

You see, the area of Bashan was noted for its lush pastures and therefore its well-fed cattle.  These were cattle that lived the good life until they were slaughtered.  This is the comparison that Amos is making to the wealthy women of Israel.  They are living the good life now because they are oppressing the people below them.  But the day is coming when they will be led away to slaughter and other people will feast off of them.

Religious Sarcasm

 After proclaiming judgment on the wealthy women, Amos then turns to talk about the sham of religious practices in which they are engaged.  Amos tells them to continue to bring all of their so-called sacrifices so that they might be received.  The problem is, these sacrifices are only for show.  They are only to impress people or fulfill what is required of them.  It is clear through the oppression by the rich and powerful that they really have no desire to follow God or abide by His ways.  The sacrifices are merely motions that these cows of Bashan are going for in some sort of mystical way to appease God so that their prosperity can continue.  Sham.

This is a pretty important passage, though.  How easy is it for us to allow our religious practices to become rote ritual?  How easy is it for our religious practices to become superstitious things we do to maintain the status quo as we go through the motions?  How easy is it for our religious practices to become things we do to make up for the areas in our life where we aren’t being obedient?  As human beings, we are all prone to see religion as our means to cover up or balance out the bad things rather than as a means to alter, change, and redeem the bad into God’s good!

Opportunities for Repentance

 The rest of the chapter is Amos speaking about opportunities that the people of Israel have had for repentance.  God sent a drought here and there.  He caused one place to fail in the harvest.  Blight and mildew ruined the crops in another place.  Locusts devoured other areas.  Pestilence overcame some.  Others lost military battles.  Still more were overthrown as Sodom and Gomorrah.

Yet, how did the people respond?  They responded by moving around their country to whatever place was not affected.  Rather than struggle through their sinfulness and come to repentance, they side-stepped what God was trying to do in their life so that they could avoid it.  They wanted to continue their lifestyle, not change it!

How true this is in most of our lives, isn’t it?  How many people do we see who bury problems and find work-around solutions rather than actually work to resolution?  How many people choose denial rather than confession?

We have all sorts of cute sayings.  “When life gives you lemons …”  “When the going gets tough …”  But the reality is that for most people, when life gives them lemons they simple leave the lemons on the ground and move elsewhere.  For most people, when the going gets tough they literally get going elsewhere.  Humanity does not default to resolving our problems.  That’s why we need proverbs to teach us a better way.

That’s God’s point here in Amos 4 as well.  God has brought them time and time again to a place for them to recognize their errors.  Yet the people constantly side-step God’s attempt t get their attention.  They are more interested in living their life their way rather than living their life God’s way.  This is an incredibly potent lesson to learn!  God brings times and places for our repentance into our life.  We’re best served recognizing them!

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Year 3, Day 225: Amos 3

Unique Relationships

God makes an important point in the beginning of Amos 3 that is often glazed over.  God tells the people that they are unique in the world.  He has known the people of the world, but not like He has known the Hebrew people.  They are unique and different.

Typically we hear comments like that and think it is a blessing – which it is. But in this chapter we should really know that it is not particularly a short-term blessing in all cases.  Because of the closeness to God with respect to the people of Israel, the wound opened up by their rejection is especially painful.  It will bring a special judgment.  I’ve said it a couple of times lately in the blog, but it is worth repeating.  Proximity to God is an awesome thing.  But it also brings greater judgment and condemnation when we walk away and act in disobedience.

As proof of this, we have Amos 3:3-8.  God compares a substantial list of experiences and the causes that bring about those experiences.  The lion roars when it has captured food.  The bird only falls to the ground when it has been snared.  People only meet and spend time together when they have planned to do so.  In this whole list, God’s point is that consequences are present because of events that lead up to them.

What’s God’s point in all of this?  God is trying to say that He sent His prophets for a reason and because of a cause.  God’s prophets aren’t speaking out against the people just because they are bored.  They aren’t trying to stir up trouble.  The reason that the prophets of God are up in arms is because yes, there actually is a problem!  That’s God’s point in these opening sections.   The presence of the prophetic voices against the people is not the cause of trouble but the effect of it!

Disaster

Have you ever had one of those conversations with a person about disaster in the world?  The conversation usually revolves around a person being willing to accept that disaster can be brought on by God.  Or perhaps the person is refusing to believe in a God who would bring disaster.  The conversation can spin out many ways.  Since those conversations are fairly common, I want to draw specific attention to verse 6.  “Does disaster come upon a city unless the Lord has done it?”

That’s a pretty profound verse.  To be honest I don’t know that I am prepared to unpack it all right here and now.  Does God know about all disaster?  Certainly.  God is omnipotent and omniscient and omnipresent.  Nothing happens that He doesn’t know about.  But am I prepared to lay all disaster of any kind at the feet of God?  Is that actually what this passage is saying?

I believe that part of this passage is also in understanding the context of Amos.  God has sent his prophet because of their sinfulness.  So the disaster in question is actual punishment for actual unrighteous behavior.  Am I prepared to assert that God will send disaster against cities and nations that are intentionally rebellious against him?  Absolutely.  The witness of the Bible is that God sent His own people into captivity under the Assyrians and Babylonians.  God will absolutely use disaster as a tool for teaching and repentance in the specific instance of judgment against sinfulness.

Rescue

As Amos proclaims destruction, he also desires to make it clear what the rescue of the Lord will look like.  We’ve heard often about the judgment and captivity under the Assyrians.  But Amos gives us a great passage on the rescue.  “As a shepherd rescues two legs and a part of an ear from a lion, so shall the Lord rescue the people of Israel.”  What an incredibly graphic description!

What is the Lord saying?  There will be rescue.  Some – a paltry few – will return.  But they will be torn apart in the process.  The nation of Israel will be destroyed.  It will be decimated.  Disaster will come as a form of punishment against the sins of Israel.

I really appreciate this message in the end of Amos.  It really does balance Law and Gospel in a very Old Testament way.  Some of the people in Israel will find repentance.  They will find God in the midst of their centuries of captivity under the Assyrians, then the Babylonians, and finally the Persians.  But most will not.  Most will fall away.  Most will actually be absorbed into the captivity of those nations and become like them.  Most will completely miss the point of the disaster and will simply fall away for good.  Grace is offered through repentance.  Many will reject it.

I wonder, how much of this same approach will happen in our current age?  People are all the time being enslaved and becoming captive to their sinful ways and sinful thoughts.  When captivity and disaster comes, do we repent?  Do we turn to God?  Or do we simply absorb the blows and continue on with life without catching what God is really trying to say to us? 

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Year 3, Day 224: Amos 2

Moab

As we open chapter 2, we see even more declarations from God against the barbarism that humanity has against itself.  In this case, we see the barbarism against the dead.  The people of Moab are accused of burning the bones of the dead.

In all likelihood, this probably is an analogous (or perhaps literal) description of grave robbing.  Grave robbing was a common and despicable practice in the ancient world.  Families often buried their loved ones with gold and treasured possessions.  Granted, they often did this in the false belief that the gold and treasure would help the person in the life to come.  However, because of the wealth often deposited in tombs the practice of grave robbing became fairly common.

The problem with humanity to which this points is not only greed but our willingness to take advantage of those least able to defend themselves.  People steal from graves because the dead cannot defend themselves.  Human beings will often kick people while they are down, and who is more down than the dead? 

However, it also demonstrates a lack of respect for the dead.  It demonstrates a lack of respect for people who are in the hands of God.  It is an assault on those who have gone to rest after their life has ended.

Judah

Once we turn to God’s people, here we see the shift in tone to how people treat each other to how people relate to God.  Now that we move into the talk about Judah, God takes His relationship with the people even more seriously.  This should only cause us to realize even more that proximity to God comes with blessing and danger.  The closer we are to God, the more likely we are to be able to follow Him.  The closer we are to God, the more personally God takes it when we fall away from how He desires us to live.

This is precisely where Amos is led against the people of Judah.  They have forsaken the ways of the Lord.  They have violated His covenant.  There lies have led one another astray from the ways of the Lord.  They have traded away God’s objective truth for their fanciful dreams and passion. 

Israel

You will notice the increased length with which God deals with the people of Israel.  There are two main reasons that the passage against Israel is longer, and these reasons are intertwined.  First, their rebellion was great.  They had walked away from the Lord and have not stopped to even turn and look back.  This leads to the second reason.  Because of their great rebellion, their judgment is coming quickly.  Because their judgment is coming quickly, God desires to focus on them through the prophet Amos.

So what is their sin?  They are engaged in selling the righteous and the needy.  That is, the people of Israel are engaged in slaving.  Connected to this is a comment that the people of Israel were willing to take advantage of the poor.  A little later in this section of verses we hear how people are willingly taking clothing as a pledge to repay.  Clothing was hard to come by in ancient days; to take someone’s clothing as a pledge was only pushing them one step closer to not having the basic necessities to survive.  The first sin of the Hebrew people is their willingness to take advantage of the people of whom it is easy to take advantage.

In addition to this, there was clear sexual sin.  Fathers and sons were having sex with the same women.  This was probably in connection to the practice of temple prostitution as the Lord connects this act also to His name being profaned.  Not only is sex being used in a sinful way, sex is also becoming a means to disrespect God and His worship.

Finally, in this opening section of verses against Israel we hear the greatest of condemnation.  They are worshipping other gods.  In all that they are doing against their fellow human beings they are also doing against their God.  In their false worship, they are even commanding the righteous few to break their vows against God.

As a result, God’s grace is suspended against the nation of Israel.  They will pay for their crimes.  They will face their consequences.  As the people forget the God that brought them out of Egypt and conquered the people of the Holy Land, so will God forget the covenant that had protected them.  The people who rebelled against God would not be able to stand against the consequences of their sin.

Again we learn the hard lesson of history.  We are human.  Part of being human is dealing with our proclivity for sinful behavior.  We can embrace it as did the Hebrew people of Amos’ day.  If so, we will reap the consequences of the sin we sow.  On the other hand, we can see our sinfulness and repent.  That is what God desires.  Our sin is inevitable – although that is no excuse.  Our repentance is that to which we are called.

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Year 3, Day 223: Amos 1

Dating and Origin of Amos

Amos was a shepherd in Tekoa, which was a fairly small town directly south of Jerusalem.  Amos is traditionally attributed to a time during the reign of Uzziah, king of Judah (792-740 BC), and Jeroboam, king of Israel (793 – 753 BC).  According to the Biblical witness, Amos is also believed to have prophesied 2 years prior to a substantial earthquake.  Archeological evidence points to a significant earthquake occurring in Israel in the year 760 BC.  It is thought that Amos was a prophet for no more than a year of time.

Judgment Against the Nations

Amos is a neat book of prophecy because here in the beginning of Amos we have a focus that is unlike most prophetic works.  Most prophetic works are concerned about the relationship with God and His people {and occasionally the Gentiles}.  While this is still certainly true in Amos, the examples Amos gives are examples that rather specifically reflect humanity’s relationship with each other.  Amos – and God speaking through him – is concerned with human barbarism.  Amos speaks out against the way we brutally treat each other.  The rest of chapter 1 and 2 will give example after example of this.

Damascus, Syria (Aram)

The first nation to be spoken against is Syria.  Of what are the Syrians guilty?  They have threshed Gilead with sledges of iron.  At first, you might think of this as a farming crime.  You might think of this as a crime against the earth.

However, think about that for which iron was used.  Iron was used to make strong weapons.  Iron was an implement for war.  Any metal – or stone, even – could handle plants and recovering grain.  Iron was an implement of war.  Amos is speaking here about the Syrians coming to war and willingly shedding so much blood in their warfare.

Historically, we know there is truth to this.  Hazael and his son Ben-Hadad III were merciless against God’s people in warfare.  In fact, look specifically at 2 Kings 13:7 and you will see a reference to Ben-Hadad treating the Hebrew people as if they were upon a threshing floor.  God’s problem with Syria (Aram) was their brutality in warfare.

Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron (Philistines)

Amos now turns to the enemies of the Hebrew people to their west.  Of what are the Philistines guilty?  A student of the Bible might ask, “Of what are they not guilty?”  In Amos, though, their crime is limited because Amos is focusing in on crimes people do against one another.  Amos convicts them of being slavers.  They captured whole villages and dragged them off to foreign countries where they sold them into slavery.

Tyre (Phoenicia)

The judgment against Tyre is nearly identical to that against the Philistines with one notable exception.  Tyre is guilty of doing their acts in violation of a treaty of brotherhood.  They were not only slavers, but self-centered backstabbing liars.  The people of Tyre made treaties of peace with the Hebrew people but then continued to raid them, capture the people, and sell them into slavery.

Together with the witness against the Philistines, we see that God values our relationships with one another.  He wants us to respect one another.  He wants us to keep our word.  He wants us to not see the next person as a means for profit. 

Edom

Edom – the people of Esau – is guilty of violently pursuing their kin.  It is one thing to disagree with kin.  It is another thing for kin to go separate ways as Jacob and Esau did.  But it is not acceptable for kin to pursue one another in hostility.  After all, if God dislikes the actions of Syria – which were violent but not against one’s kin, how much more must it displease God when human beings are violent to people they should be able to love or at least tolerate?

No, Edom forsook their kinship with God’s people.  Edom treated them with contempt.  Edom could have left them alone or even treated them with respect.  But out of brotherly jealousy they pursued them like a true adversary.  God was not pleased.

Ammon

Ammon is charged with ripping open pregnant women.  Most people think that this is a literal accusation as it was common in times of war.  You see, if you fight against a people and literally tear unborn babies for the wombs of their mothers it will demoralize the defeated enemy quite sufficiently.  It might even cause them to flee just to leave the horror of the act behind them.  The other thing it did was to destroy the next generation of people who would be raised up to take revenge.  It was a disgusting but fairly common practice during ancient warfare.

But the sin of Ammon goes further.  This wasn’t done just as an act of war.  This was done because Ammon was greedy.  Their goal was simply to expand their borders.  They weren’t really at war; they just wanted to take what belonged to the Hebrew people and make it their own.  So here we see that the Ammonites were behaving like barbarians out of their greed.  Ho common is this practice all throughout history!

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Year 3, Day 222: 2 Peter 3

The World is Stable

This last chapter of 2 Peter deals primarily with the return of Christ.  In fact, these words are Peter’s appeal to the faithful to continue to believe that Christ will return.  After all, a few generations have gone by since Jesus was raised from the dead and ascended into heaven.  Disciples are beginning to die.  The “faithful generation” is beginning to experience death.  People are asking Peter, “What happened to this promised return of Jesus?  Is He coming back or has He forgotten us?”

Peter gives us a brilliant insight in verse 4.  It’s brilliant because it is incredibly human.  The argument proposed by those who doubt the return of Christ is that “the world hasn’t changed.”  Things are as they always have been.  Life continues as life has continued for generations.  After all, we as human beings do have a strong dislike for change.  When left in charge, we will remain the same.  Solomon even tells us in Ecclesiastes that there is nothing new under the sun.  If nothing has ever changed, they argue, then what makes Peter so confident that things will ever change in the future?  What makes Peter so confident that Christ will ever return?

Peter’s reply is actually very simple given the complexity of the question that is being posed.  Peter’s reply is that not everything is as it has always been.  There was creation, yes.  But then as civilization developed there was the flood.  God destroyed civilization once.  So things are not always as they have been.  Furthermore, one could argue that there have been subtle points of change after that: the Law and the development of the temple in Jerusalem.  Jesus Himself instituted an incredible amount of change in being here.

In fact, if we look at the genealogy of Jesus we can see something rather amazing.  I don’t like genealogies, so I only gave this a rough count.  Feel free to check out my accuracy.  But in Luke 3:23-38 we have the genealogy from Jesus to Adam.  By my count there were 76 names on the list.  Over 40 of them were from Jesus to David (42, I believe).  Abraham is a dozen or so more (56, I believe).  Nearly another dozen brings us to Noah (67, if I continued to count correctly).  That brings us then to Adam, the 76^th name.

Why is this significant?  Remember first that people lived longer at the time prior to Abraham.  But it took a good ten generations for God to bring about drastic change to the world through the flood.  What would that be … 1,000 years – give or take a bunch?  Another dozen generations brings us to Abraham – add a few more and we get to the time of Moses – where God brings about another change in the idea of covenant and Law.  Again, that’s another thousand or so years – give or take based on the longevity of people in those days.  From Moses to Jesus was somewhere in the vicinity of twelve hundred years – David to Jesus was almost exactly a thousand years.

My point is not in the accuracy of the math.  My point is that God brings about change in the world after vast amounts of time have spanned.  To think that God is going to usher in a major change in Jesus and then end the world in a few dozen years just doesn’t match up with God’s modus operandi.  It simply not how God works.  As we see just by looking at the lineage of Jesus, God moves in the dozens of generations, not in the dozens of months or years.

To return us back to the argument Peter is refuting, the world only seems stable when we look at it from the short-sighted perspective of man.  When we consider the scope of the world according to creation, there have been incredible points of change spaced out across the millennia.  This naturally brings us to Peter’s brilliant point in verses 8-9.

Reason for God’s Delay

Peter doesn’t just remind the detractors about God’s hand at work through the generations.  Peter also gives a reason for God’s delay.  It’s a very humbling reason – one that has kept me honest more often than not in my own life.  God is patient because He wants to give everyone a chance to know salvation.

I think back to those rough moments of depression I have suffered.  I think of days {sometimes even weeks or months and in one case, years} where I’ve gone through life with a single thought: “Lord, please take me now; I’m done living.”  There are times when I’ve pleaded for the return of Christ so that I could just be with God and no longer be a part of this world. 

How sickeningly self-serving and self-centered such thoughts are!  You see, God wants people to be saved.  In my impatience I want to be apart from the world.  Where is my focus in those times – on God’s reality or mine?  On God’s agenda or my own struggle?

You see?  God wants people to be saved, which is why Jesus Christ delays.  Truth be told, I am grateful Jesus’ return has been delayed.  Had Christ come when I pleaded with God, I wouldn’t have had the years of growth I’ve been able to experience.  As much as I would love to be with God, I am grateful for His spirit of maturity and wisdom.

Endings

Peter then ends this second epistle.  Peter reminds the people to grow in the time that God has given to them.  Peter reminds them to be faithful.  He ends by reminding the people that it is to God’s grace and glory that we live.  Amen.  May that be true above all else.

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