A study of Amos

I have made it my goal to start reading through the Minor Prophets in the Old Testament.  Books that I don’t think that I have ever read before.  I have said their names before and heard specific verses from them, but I have never sat down and read through them with the history going on in that time in my head. 

Today, my lovely dogs barking asking to go outside woke me up before dawn.  Finally, after yelling at them, shushing them and lying in bed for 2 more hours, I got out of my soft, warm bed at 6:00.  I said goodbye to my husband who was going to play some basketball, made my pot of coffee, candied my personal cup and sat down ready to read the book of Amos (I am reading from the New Living Translation in all these). 

Amos was a shepherd and a fig farmer.  He was not an educated priest, a servant, a born prophet…  He was just an ordinary guy doing what God told him to do.  He was sending a message.  The message was about destruction, about things that were going to happen because the social injustices that were being done, because the hatred and idol worshiping and lewdness.  I had a hard time putting my highlighter down.  What is more, 2 years later, what he said actually happened.

I have always thought that this time and place was the most morally decrepit and disgusting time to live.  Reading through Amos, I see that there were a lot of moral issues then too. 

1:13 “… When they attacked Gilead to extend their boarders, they ripped open pregnant women with their swords.”

2:7 “They trample helpless people in the dust and shove the oppressed out of the way.  Both father and son sleep with the same woman, corrupting my holy name.” 

The list goes on and on.  I actually wrote “YUCK” in my Bible, next to these verses.  I cringe thinking of the killing and “guts spilling on the ground” and the thought of father and son sleeping with the same woman, especially if that woman was that son’s mother.  Israel failed to listen, much like we fail to listen; we follow the path of the wicked and choose to compromise our values. 

4:4-5a, 6a and 7  “Now this is what the Lord says to the family of Israel: ‘Come back to me and live! (5) Don’t worship at the pagan altars at Bethel; don’t go to the shrines at Gilgal or Beersheba…. (6) Come back to the Lord and live! (7) You twist justice making it a bitter pill for the oppressed.  You treat the righteous like dirt.”

Does this sound familiar?  Verse 7 especially- you twist justice…  What are we doing in this day and age?  Aren’t we twisting justice?  Aren’t the nations treating the righteous like dirt? 

5:15a: “Hate evil and love what is good, turn your courts into true halls of justice.” 

HATE EVIL  - love what is good. 

6:3: “You push away every thought of coming disaster, but your actions only bring the day of judgment closer.” 

I don’t have to add very much to the verses that I am sharing; I believe they speak for themselves.  Shortly after he tells us to hate evil and love what is good he goes on to explain that so many are waiting for the day of the Lord.  They think that they are going to be saved when they are doing evil and not living for God. 

5:18-20 “What sorrow awaits you who say, ‘If only the day of the Lord were here!’ You have no idea what you are wishing for.  That day will bring darkness, not light.  (19) In that day you will be like a man who runs from a lion- only to meet a bear.  Escaping from the bear, he leans his hand against a wall in his house- and he’s bitten by a snake.  (20) Yes, the day of the Lord will be dark and hopeless, without a ray of joy or hope.” 

All I can add is a prayer to this:

Lord, thank you that you loved me enough to send people like Amos to remind me of my actions.  Thank you that you prepare us for what is to come and give us a guide through the Bible to live by.  Help me to hate evil, love what is good.  Help us all to be morally good, to help those who need help, to stand up for justice and for the oppressed.  Let our lives be an example of how you want your children to act.  I can’t promise to always be perfect.  Thank you for Jesus who was and has taken away my imperfections.  Please Lord, guide me in a way that is pleasing to you, be with our state, our nation, our world and show us how to bring them to you.