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Amos – Chapter 9

Ok, so I know I’ve said this before, but the proclamation in chapter 9 is mega-super-fierce. It’s a vision, so we can’t take the imagery literally (it wouldn’t make sense with the end of the chapter if we did). However, that doesn’t mean it’s not intended to communicate something tangible and impactful to the people Amos is talking to.
The Lord is giving instructions here and will use two ends of a spectrum (top of the column and bottom of column, Sheol to heaven, mountain top to bottom of the sea) to communicate the complete judgment upon Israel and the warning that none shall be able to hide or flee from the coming wrath. Their efforts to escape are fruitless.
God says, “I will fix my eyes upon them for evil and not for good”. Hmm, does this impact your perception of God? It should be part of it. It’s not new, either. God says a very similar thing in Deuteronomy 28. It does bring into question, though, how we are to understand “evil” and “good” in these contexts, for the purpose of all this seems to be Israel’s restoration (as we will see yet still in this chapter and as was listed later on in the previous use in Deuteronomy 30). In general, his attention is upon his people and he will cause and allow evil to come upon them and persist in light of their rebellion as it seems to be the way to call them back to restoration. How many modern parenting books does that jack with? This is followed, again, by a reminder of who exactly they are dealing with.
He continues back with the Cushites, Philistines and Syrians to provide context that he is sovereign over those nations as well and that the very things His people may have been praying for against those nations will ironically fall upon Israel itself. Israel will be destroyed from the surface of the ground…except it won’t (again, it’s a vision, you have to let it breathe a little). Basically, there’s still hope it can be rebuilt.
In fact, the next part talks of God commanding that although Israel shall be tested and tried and put through the ringer for their rebellion, they will not be utterly destroyed. The distinction of those that will be destroyed seems to be those who believe they are immune from it.
And then the hope comes. There will be a day when the ruined, torn, fallen house of David shall be rebuilt once again. However, they will bear the responsibility for bringing light to Edom and to all the nations (this is how Acts interprets this section, see Acts 15:16-17.) And those days will be bountiful (the guy plowing will overtake the guy harvesting because the ground produces so well, similar to the wine-maker). All will be restored, made new and provide graciously for the people. The tricky part in all of this is the notion of Israel as a “land” vs. a kingdom (as this promise is understood to be fulfilled by Jesus).
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Amos – Chapter 8

All false idols are like that, in their day as well as ours. They make promises that we foolishly buy into. But when you’re in the trench and going through the dregs of life, porn, food, pride, money and power don’t have your back. But they’ll be all you have left when you tell the prophets of God to shut up.
Amos gets another vision from God and it is indeed dire. God has a basket of summer fruit, which is picked at the end of the season. I’m assuming that this is an indication to Amos that the season God has allowed is coming to a close and the fruits are now being gathered (and Israel’s fruits are junky and bring them ruin). There are other potential interpretations there probably but that makes sense to me, especially when coupled with the pronouncement that the end has come to the people and the reiteration that he will not pass over their sin anymore.
The picture is an especially rough one. The exile will be indiscriminate and violent. Bodies will be strewn about treated without honor (lying around, no proper burial). And although that’s a shocking image, Amos reminds them of what got them there: treating the poor terribly, focusing on their own gain over concern for others (when will all of these holidays/holy days be over so I can get back to selling my goods?) and generally being deceitful in business (false balances, selling the worthless part of the wheat, etc.) God will not forgot how prideful they’ve been and the repercussions are equaled only in the power of nature.
The judgment will be so terrible that nature itself will be impacted. Do I think the sun really is going down at noon? No. Darkness, moon and sun being impacted in very unnatural ways, are all ways the Bible has described judgment. Could it be literal? Sure. But it’s not likely and it’s not the most natural reading of the text. And note the rest of the section, everything gets flipped on its head; feasts into mourning, songs into lamentations, sackcloth everywhere, rampant baldness (intentionally, sign of mourning, check Isaiah), etc.
Compounding the dire situation of the exile, God also declares a famine…of His words. He will turn them over to the Assyrians and they will be denied the comfort of God’s words even though they will desire them. What he has communicated thus far will be all they have to chew on. He is almost turning them over, saying “go to your idols, let them save you.” You set up false temples at Samaria, Dan and Beersheba, what they have given you is all you have left. All false idols are like that, in their day as well as ours. They make promises that we foolishly buy into. But when you’re in the trench and going through the dregs of life, porn, food, pride, money and power don’t have your back. But they’ll be all you have left when you tell the prophets of God to shut up.
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Amos – Chapter 7

Chapter 7 opens with a series of visions God gives to Amos. The first two are visions of circumstances that would bring destruction to Israel (forming locusts to basically eat the budding wheat crop after the king’s share has already been paid and a fire judgment so fierce that it consumes the land and the water). Amos, even after he has been the conduit through which judgment has been proclaimed to Israel up to this point, begs God to forgive and relent and, interestingly, God agrees.
 
The third vision has God himself standing next to a wall with a plumb line (this is not a unique use of this metaphor in Scripture) and the gist is that they don’t measure up. They are out of balance and will fall under their own weight. You should read, “…never again pass by them…” as “I will not pass over their transgressions ever again.” The false temples will be destroyed and the king, Jeroboam, is held accountable (which foreshadows a conversation that is about to take place between Amos and Jeroboam’s adviser.)
 
Then Amaziah shows up, a “priest” at Bethel (dig the quotes, remember this is a false temple this man is presiding over.) He’s here to warn Jeroboam about what Amos is saying, primarily that Jeroboam is to die and Israel to be removed from their land. Then Amaziah addresses Amos directly, telling him to leave Israel and go home to Judah and basically spout your crapola back there, but keep your words from Bethel because it (you know, the false temple) is the king’s sanctuary (oh man, that can’t be good) and it is a temple of the kingdom (ding, ding, ding, we have a loser and an understanding of how the wall is all jacked up compared to the plumb line God has out.)
 
Amos defends himself, basically saying that he didn’t ask for this job, he’s a fig man, not a prophet. But when God tells you to do the thing you do the thing. And God goes to bat for Amos against Amaziah and says that everything he holds dear will be taken from him (wife becomes a prostitute, kids will die in battle, land will be taken from you and given to others), and, of course, Israel is still getting the boot.
 
Lesson here, you don’t attempt to shut up the words of the prophet (note they have consistently done this, as Amos pointed out earlier). Telling the prophet not to speak doesn’t change what is going to happen, it just causes you to not know about it.
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Amos – Chapter 6

The woes continue to be aimed at those who seem to be at leisure in both Judah (Zion) and Israel (Samaria). These top of society folks are invited to visit Calneh, Hamath and Gath, cities in their vicinity (and who representatively surround them) who have already fallen. God’s people are blind and arrogant, they refuse to repent and bring the disaster upon themselves.
 
Woe again to the rich. They sleep on rich beds, relax when there is work to be done, eat tender meats, sing (which we already know the Lord despises) and drink whole bowl fulls of wine! Seems a bit over the top, being so rich and wasteful that you slob wine into your mouth from a bowl, but it’s probably the right picture of these people. And they are blind to how the house of Joseph is being ruined (Ephraim and Manasseh, Joseph’s sons, were given portions of land from Israel/Jacob even though they were his grandchildren not his sons). Israel (the northern kingdom, not the man) was predominantly made up of Ephraim and Manasseh, thus the reference to the ruin of Joseph.
 
Israel, then, will be exiled before Judah. God abhor’s their pride, their arrogance in walking so far from him and acting as if they are blessed and indestructible. He hates their self-protection (strongholds) so he will deliver their nation over to the Assyrians if that is the only way to get them to repent.
 
v.9-10 are a bit difficult to discern. Where a group of men remain gathered, they will die. Could be illustrative that even where men gather to defend themselves against what God is to bring they shall perish. But then some dude shows up to bury the dead and another guy shows up and asks if anyone is living and guy 1 tells guy 2 that no one lives and to shut up and don’t even mention the name of the Lord. I really love that story, I’m just not quite sure what it means. (How dare we call upon him now? Don’t speak lest he know we’re here and we die, too? Just not sure.)
 
This chapter ends with a re-assertion that Israel has chased a strategy that any reasonable person would know was destructive. You don’t try to plow on rocks with either your horse or oxen just like you don’t deny justice and turn it into poison, and you don’t reject righteousness (again, Amos consistently groups these together because poetry. Quit being a barbarian literalist and take in the art form the way the Lord has given it.)
 
They are fools because they celebrate their capture of Lo-debar and Karnaim, they are full of their own pride at these victories. Yet, God’s justice upon them will be complete from Lebo-hamath (northernmost city) to the Brook of Arabah (southernmost city). The hand of the Lord will not be able to be denied this exile will be so complete. If only they would seek Him and live.
 
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Amos – Chapter 5

 
 
There’s a glimmer of hope buried in chapter 5, a call to repentance, but ultimately Amos doesn’t appear optimistic that they will respond accordingly.
 
He opens with “Hear this word…”, a familiar phrase that opened chapter 3 and showed up twice in chapter 4. The lament is dire, Israel has fallen and what God has raised as pure and undefiled is forsaken with no one to rescue her. I’m hesitant on the context of v.3, it seems like it is predicting the remnant that will stay (not be exiled) but it could also just be a poetic picture of the impact of God’s judgment upon them.
 
Then the hope: Seek God and live. But there’s a clarification here – you actually have to seek God. He again brings up the falseness of the worship at Gilgal, Beersheba, and Bethel. God is not fooled by the show and will not accept this shallow worship that is just for men. He will not stand for the disregard of justice and their refusal to pursue righteousness. This is the God who made the stars, controls darkness, the day, the night, the water and the surface of the earth — the Lord is his name! (Again, when you know who you’re dealing with, it simply makes no sense to think He can be fooled or bought off by formulaic fake worship.)
 
Starting in v.10, Amos lays out again his case of their unrighteousness using the city gate as a backdrop. There were gates in the walls that guarded cities that were closed for protection in times of war. In times of peace, they were generally open and men would gather at the gates and conduct business, settle disputes, things of that nature. In this context, we see that these men anger at people trying to do right business or speak truth because it calls them out for trampling the poor. In response, they will not get to enjoy that which was built upon the backs of the poor. They will be taken from their houses and will not get to enjoy their wine. The took bribes, favored the rich, rejected the needy – this is an indictment on how far they have fallen, their refusal to do what is right.
 
Yet if they seek good, they will live and God will be with them. (What mercy is this? These people suck. And…we suck. What mercy indeed.) They do still have to change their ways (repent, establish justice at the gate) and God may be gracious.
 
But…it doesn’t look like that is going to happen because we’re back to the wailing in the streets and the crying farmers and a strange call out to those who are good at lamenting because it needs to be done and you might as well have your best fellas on the job. As opposed to the presence of God being a positive, it is surrounded by wailing. Pretty strong contrasts here.
 
In blindness, God’s people seem to have been calling for the Day of the Lord. My guess is that they thought they were calling for God to come and judge their enemies and that they would be exalted. Consistent with the opening of Amos, though, God is equitable in his justice and those calling for God to make his presence known in his people are calling ultimately for their own judgment and punishment. That’s why Amos is talking about this wailing and such as God passes through their midst. It will be a dark time, not a joyous time. It is a time when they thought they would be safe (hey, I escaped a lion) only to find out they weren’t safe at all (dang, I ran into this bear).
 
v. 21 – 24 are just brutal. God hates their crappy, soulless, lying worship. Their feasts, their gatherings, it all sucks. He rejects their offerings, every one of them, doesn’t even want to see them. He doesn’t want to hear their songs, calls them noise. What does he want? Justice. Righteousness. (Notice how it echoes v.7 in this chapter. Don’t miss the poetic nature of Amos, for a fire and brimstone kind of a guy he has a real talent for language.)
 
And the chapter ends with a very bold and specific proclamation – you will be exiled beyond Damascus, you and your images of these false Mesopotamian gods. Because, again, don’t forget who you are dealing with.
 
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Amos – Chapter 4

And…the prophet of the Lord calls the ladies of Israel “cows of Bashan”. That’s, well, you know, not good. The animals in reference were likely plump, well-fed cows, a striking comparison to the “poor” and “needy” the ladies of Israel are oppressing. And they celebrate as they do so. The ladies share the punishment laid out previously, they will be taken from their land like a fish being lifted out of the water by hooks, led through their broken defenses out of their homes.
 
Then Amos becomes sarcastic – Go ahead and go to your false worship centers (Bethel and Gilgal), bring your worthless sacrifices and your tithes, bring your leavened bread, and make sure everyone sees what you’re doing. As will be stated further by guys like Malachai, God is not satisfied with your bogus offerings – he desires mercy not sacrifice. Your show, facade, of offerings doesn’t fly with the Lord.
 
Then Amos lays out all the times God has tried to get their attention and they have not paid attention. These examples are pretty poetic. “Cleanness of teeth” means you didn’t have any food to get them dirty. God withheld food from them to get their attention and they didn’t come back to him. He withheld rain, sent blight, mildew, and locusts to destroy their crops and still they ignored it. (This harkens back to the to the previous accusation of shutting up the prophets. God was talking, they didn’t want to listen.)
 
v.11 is interesting, I’m not sure why God refers to himself in the 3rd person (the Hebrew isn’t clear on this and I don’t know Hebrew anyway). v.12 is also interesting as the repetition of the phrase “I will do to you” reads a little funny. However, it makes way for one of the most powerful declarations in Scripture for v.13:
 

For behold, he who forms the mountains and creates the wind, and declares to man what is his thought, who makes the morning darkness, and treads on the heights of the earth—the LORD, the God of hosts, is his name!

Dang! That last part is fierce. Amos is taking pains to remind the people exactly who they are dealing with.

 
 
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Amos – Chapter 3

Amos continues the judgment against Israel. They are reminded that of all the people in the earth, God has dwelled with and made covenant with them, and they have rejected it. Afterwards a series of examples that illustrate logical connections (two people walk together because they agreed to meet, lions roar because they have no prey…) and the Lord sends word that the fire is on the way because they deserve it.
 
The next section is fierce. Amos instructs Israel to call the Philistines over (Ashdod) and Egypt so they can come over to Samaria (Israel’s capital) and see how junky Israel is. (Hey there, call your friends over so they can see how crappy you are. Rough times.) But, when you store up violence and robbery and ignore the Lord, that kind of ends up being the deal.
 
And then the word from God comes on what will happen: An enemy will come and surround the land and Israel will not be able to defend themselves. In fact, the comparison of what will remain is basically what a shepherd is able to rescue from a lion that has gotten a sheep (a couple legs, maybe a piece of an ear, etc.) That said, I can’t quite discern the “…the corner of a couch and part of a bed”, unless it is highlight the places of comfort, their home, shall only remain in pieces.
 
The imagery to finish out the chapter is one of destruction. The Lord of Hosts (think armies) will punish Israel and cut off the horns of the altar of Bethel (these are the horns that someone would grab to proclaim sanctuary when there was trouble against them. God is removing all protections). And he targets the luxury that Israel has acquired (winter and summer houses, houses of ivory, great houses), which I think affirms the couch and bed imagery interpretation from earlier.
 
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Amos – Chapter 2

 
Continuing, Moab sucks because they have disrespected the bones of the King of Edom in a dastardly way (removing them from their resting place and burning them.) It’s a bit interesting that God is reinforcing respect for the bones of a nation He is also set to punish, although this is likely just presented as an example of how Moab behaves and thus what has caused their punishment. Again, fire to Moab, along with death. Sound of trumpet should likely be understood as heralds to battle. All said, strongholds are gone, ruler will be cut off and his sons will die.

 
Continuing…and this is the point that becomes much more difficult for Amos to say and for Judah to hear, Judah sucks because they have rejected the laws of God. The people who assumed their prosperity was at the hands of God are told that their unwillingness to follow God and the lies they tell themselves about how they are doing has led them astray and will bring punishment. God’s people get the same consequences as their enemies, judgment and the devouring of strongholds.
 
Then it is Israel’s turn (Northern Kingdom). They have traded good people out for riches. They have mistreated and ignored the poor and God will not stand for it. Father and son share women, they worship false idols, and get drunk in their false temples (they should be worshiping in Jerusalem but set up a couple other temples and thought that’d be fine. They were incorrect.)
 
God makes the case that there is no excuse for their foolishness. He destroyed the Amorites in front of them, brought the people out of Egypt to take the land from the Amorites, and brought up people within Israel to be prophets, to keep them on the straight and narrow. But they jacked it up. They had the priests drink booze and told the prophets not to speak. So, God will bring justice upon them. You will not be able to run or defend yourself and even the great among you will not be able to sustain.
 
Your horse will not help, your bow will not help, and your stout heart will not help.
 
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Amos – Chapter 1

Amos opens with an introduction of who he is. It’s interesting who he is not, which is a denoted prophet. In fact, he’s just a shepherd (Tekoa is a town just south of Jerusalem, so it’s in Judah. I remember Israel is in the north and Judah to the south by the order of the first letter of their names in the alphabet. “I” is first, it’s on top of “J”, which is on the bottom.) Either way, his target is Israel in the days of Uzziah (which makes him a bit of a contemporary of Isaiah, who has the famous scene in Isaiah 6 where he gets the vision in heaven in the year Uzziah dies.) 
 
Make no mistake, Amos brings the heavy. In the first chapter he’s basically going to lay out some consistently patterned judgment upon the nations that surround Israel. They suck, and God’s people will be glad to hear what Amos is saying here. (They shouldn’t get too comfortable, they don’t know it yet but their time has also come, God is sick of their stuff, too.) 
 
Amos establishes that it is God we’re hearing from by giving a picture of him “roaring from Zion”. The very earth weeps at this and the mountain where the gods of the world were defeated soundly (Mt. Carmel, it’s where God whooped upon Baal with Elijah calling the fire down). You know there’s going to be some business going down with this opening salvo.
 
Here we go: Syria sucks (north of Israel, and we know it’s them, Damascus is their capital) because they have ransacked and torn through Gilead, a part of Israel. So God will judge them and it will land on the King (Ben-Hedad) who has no means to protect himself from God’s wrath in this area. The towns referenced and people referenced here show that God intimately knows who he is dealing with and bringing judgment upon. They shall be sent back to Kir (their original land) and out of the lands where they have stuck their nose where it doesn’t belong. 
 
Next, Philistia sucks (on the Mediterranean coast, just west of Judah), because they were in cahoots with the Edomites and booted people out of their land. Again, God responds with judgment/fire and the breaking of any protections the Philistines believe they have, and their leaders will be dealt with harshly (again, they are called out by name).
 
Next, Tyre sucks (north of Philistia, west of Israel) for basically the same reason Philistia sucks, they were in cahoots with Edom. (The Edomites were Esau’s descendants, by the way.) In addition, Tyre seemed to have agreements with these people (close enough to be considered a “covenant of brotherhood”), that they ignored in this cahootery with Edom. Poor form. So, fire to the wall of Tyre and strongholds devoured. Pretty consistent here.  
 
Then there’s Edom, a merciless group of hooligans who openly treated their “brothers” (Israel), in anger and without pity. We don’t get kings named here, just cities (Teman and Bozrah), but the gist is the same, fire and devouring of strongholds. 
 
Finally for chapter 1, the Ammonites (just east of Israel). They suck because they have “ripped open pregnant women in Gilead” in an attempt to gain land. As expected, God responds with fire and devouring of strongholds. Kings are back in view here and they he will be exiled, along with his sons. 
 
The reason I opened with Assyria as a backdrop is because God will use the Assyrians, at a time when these nations believed Assyria was losing power, as the means to keep the promises our man Amos is making now. 
 
 
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Amos | Introduction

Amos was likely written in the mid 700 BC’s. Assyria was an aggressive nation and in the 800’s had asserted itself from its original territory (think parts of modern day Iraq and Iran) all the way over to the Mediterranean coast (modern day Israel-Palestine). However, by the 700’s, they had hit a lull and the two kingdoms of Israel (Israel and Judah) had experienced relative peace and earthly wealth/success. They believed God was providing this because He was pleased with them and awaited the day when God would bring justice upon the nations that surrounded them. For a more extensive introduction, check out this video from the Bible Project: