Sunday, February 11, 2007-AM

Amos: When God's People Aren't Any Better Than the World

Prepare to Meet Thy God

Amos 4

Introduction: What's God to Do With His People?

Amos has already pronounced condemnation on the self-serving people of Israel. He has already described their sins against God in the way they were treating the poor and needy of their own countrymen, and also their sins against God in the way they worshiping. He explained the reason for such a severe condemnation against God's people, i.e., God's people are held to a higher standard because of the covenant relationship they enjoy with God. He has hinted at what God would do them because of their unfaithfulness, and now, in chapter four, he'll tell us some more.

"Hear this word, you cows of Bashan,

who are on the mountain of Samaria,

who oppress the poor, who crush the needy,

who say to your husbands, 'Bring, that we may drink!'

The Lord God has sworn by his holiness

that, behold, the days are coming upon you,

when they shall take you away with hooks,

even the last of you with fishhooks.

And you shall go out through the breaches,

each one straight ahead;

and you shall be cast out into Harmon,"

declares the Lord.

"Come to Bethel, and transgress;

to Gilgal, and multiply transgression;

bring your sacrifices every morning,

your tithes every three days;

offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving of that which is leavened,

and proclaim freewill offerings, publish them;

for so you love to do, O people of Israel!"

declares the Lord God.

"I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities,

and lack of bread in all your places,

yet you did not return to me,"

declares the Lord.

"I also withheld the rain from you

when there were yet three months to the harvest;

I would send rain on one city,

and send no rain on another city;

one field would have rain,

and the field on which it did not rain would wither;

so two or three cities would wander to another city

to drink water, and would not be satisfied;

yet you did not return to me,"

declares the Lord.

"I struck you with blight and mildew;

your many gardens and your vineyards,

your fig trees and your olive trees the locust devoured;

yet you did not return to me,"

declares the Lord.

"I sent among you a pestilence after the manner of Egypt;

I killed your young men with the sword,

and carried away your horses,

and I made the stench of your camp go up into your nostrils;

yet you did not return to me,"

declares the Lord.

"I overthrew some of you,

as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah,

and you were as a brand plucked out of the burning;

yet you did not return to me,"

declares the Lord.

"Therefore thus I will do to you, O Israel;

because I will do this to you,

prepare to meet your God, O Israel!"

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!

Describing the People of God Again

Again, Amos begins his pronouncement of condemnation on the people by giving the reasons for it. Again, he attacks two aspects of the people of Israel that are detestable to God. First, with a slight difference, he attacks the selfishness of the rich women of Israel. Yes, he calls them "cows" (the old KJV has "kine," which is the Middle English word for cows). These women sit around all day eating bonbons at the expense of the poor and the needy, encouraging their husbands to take advantage of these helpless folks in order to for these lazy "cows" to maintain their luxurious lifestyle. Amos then assures them that they will be violently ripped from this lifestyle through hole in their walls.

Secondly, Amos attacks the worship of the people. Notice how they are sort of endeavoring to worship Jehovah, but not entirely according to the Law and not with pure motives. They publish their freewill offerings, making worship more about reputation than about humbly honoring God. Amos is quite clear about what this kind of worship is, i.e., it is a multiplication of transgressions. This kind of presumptuous, self-centered worship always has and always will anger God.

Failing to Heed the Warnings

Amos then proceeds to tell them that God has been trying make them aware of the fact that He is not at all pleased with them, but they have failed to heed the warnings. He has sent famine, drought, blight, mildew, locust, pestilence, war and even fire to awaken them to the fact that they are not living right. He has even localized some of these things to the point that they should have easily recognized that it was from God. Yet, they failed to see it.

It wasn't as if God were somehow being vague about it. After all, if they had consulted the book of the Law, which they probably never did, they would have easily seen in there that these specific things were fulfillments of prophecy concerning what God would do in view of their unfaithfulness. In Deuteronomy 28:20-25, Moses was very clear in presenting the warning signs to the people of Israel if they should turn away from God:

"The Lord will send on you curses, confusion, and frustration in all that you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken me. The Lord will make the pestilence stick to you until he has consumed you off the land that you are entering to take possession of it. The Lord will strike you with wasting disease and with fever, inflammation and fiery heat, and with drought and with blight and with mildew. They shall pursue you until you perish. And the heavens over your head shall be bronze, and the earth under you shall be iron. The Lord will make the rain of your land powder. From heaven dust shall come down on you until you are destroyed.

"The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies. You shall go out one way against them and flee seven ways before them. And you shall be a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth.

They should have been aware of the warning signs, leading them to awaken to their spiritual disease, but they were not, and so they did not. Five times Lord says through Amos, "yet you did not return to me."

Meeting God on the Battlefield

God had been patient with them. He had given them opportunity after opportunity to change, but they refused to see the need to change. Interestingly enough, each warning sign was more severe than the one before it, but none of them were sufficient to arouse Israel from its spiritual complacency because they were to self-involved. They likely blamed the curses God had sent on them on everything but their unfaithfulness. Ironically, they likely also tried to appease other gods, thinking those non-deities had been responsible for these afflictions, which would explain why they were found "beside every altar" (2:8). God had indeed been patient with them.

However, His longsuffering had come to an end. He set a day when Israel would have to stand toe to toe with Him. The adversary they would meet on the battlefield was none other than "the Lord, the God of hosts." "Hosts" refers to armies. The Lord would send His armies, which could be any of the armies of the kingdoms of earth, for He is in control of them all, and they would defeat the people of Israel.

Israel might have felt confident to withstand some of their enemies, as they were living in a time of political stability, but they could not stand against the Lord.

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!

Needless to say, Israel was not prepared for the confrontation, but who really ever could be fight against God?

Conclusion: Are You Prepared to Meet God on the Day of Judgment?

Brethren, we, too, will meet our God on the Day of Judgment. We will account for how we've lived our lives. We will have to answer for our unfaithfulness, for how we have mistreated others and for how we have worshiped God according to our desires and for self-serving reasons. Are we prepared to meet Him?

The only way that anyone is ever prepared to meet God is to be in Christ. Christ, standing as our intercessor and defender, will, on the basis of His blood, present us as pure and holy. Our objective as Christians is to remain in Christ—to love Christ, to trust Christ and to obey Christ. As long as remain in Him, confessing our sins and endeavoring to be obedient to Him, we will have forgiveness of sins. However, if we aren't really concerned about obeying Him and living the life He desires us to live, refusing to acknowledge our sins and seldom ever giving a thought to Him, then we will jeopardize our standing with Him, and eventually be without the forgiveness of sins.

The writer of the book of Hebrews has provided us with some warnings that will help us to determine whether or not we are in danger of falling away from Christ. He doesn't state them as warnings but, rather, as things those Christians needed to do to keep from falling away. I'll state them as questions, which will enable each of us to take inventory of our faith:

· Do you pay close attention to the message of Christ? (2:1-3a—Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. For since the message declared by angels proved to be reliable and every transgression or disobedience received a just retribution, how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?)

· Do you interact with the word on a daily basis? Do you engage it with an open heart? Are you in some way involved in a daily mutually encouraging relationship with another or other believers? (3:7-13—Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, "Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, on the day of testing in the wilderness, where your fathers put me to the test and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I was provoked with that generation, and said, 'They always go astray in their heart; they have not known my ways.' As I swore in my wrath, 'They shall not enter my rest.' "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called "today," that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.)

· Do you consciously strive to be obedient to God? (4:11—Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience.

· Do you continually draw near to God in worship? (10:22—let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.)

· Do you hold fast your confession by the way you live? (10:23—Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.)

· Do you regularly assemble with the brethren? (10:24-25—And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.)

If you have answered "no" to any of these questions, then there is one final question that you must answer: Are you going to continue to refuse the message that you need to change? (12:25—See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven.)

Christian, are you prepared to meet God?

If you've never become a Christian in the way the New Testament tells us to do that—coming to Christ in faith in who He is, determining to stop living for self and for sin, confessing Him to be your Lord, and being baptized into water for the forgiveness of your sins—then you are not ready to meet God in the judgment. You must get into Christ before you're ready. "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ" (Galatians 3:26). Are you in Christ?

If you're not ready to meet God on the Day of Judgment, then we want to encourage you right now to get ready.