Amos: Let Justice Roll (Amos 1-3)

Let Justice Roll
Amos 5:24

INTRODUCTION:
This past Monday was Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Our nation has set aside this day to honor MLK and what he contributed to the rights of black Americans. I do not agree with everything MLK taught, neither politically nor religiously. But I am thankful that he contributed to a better view of equality among the races in our country.

In MLK’s famous "I have a dream” speech, which he delivered August 28, 1963 at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC, he made this brief this brief statement: “We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until ‘justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.’”

That last statement: “Justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream," originated with a minor prophet in the OT named Amos. Each year, I select a minor prophet and give a series of lessons from his sermons in order to learn about that minor prophet and to bring his message up-to-date for 21st century Americans. This year, we’ll study Amos; we’ll have three lessons from Amos.

BACKGROUND
Amos informs us in 1:1 that he preached during the days of King Uzziah of Judah and King Jeroboam II of Israel. That would put him about 750 years before Jesus. This date also means that he was a contemporary of Jonah.

The story of King Uzziah is told in 1 Kings 15:1-7. That historian tells us that King Uzziah was, basically, a good king. He began reigning at 16 years old and God blessed him with a reign of 55 years! I said that King Uzziah was “basically” a good king because he did not take away all the false places of worship as he should have done. The historian also tells us that King Uzziah was struck with leprosy until the day he died. But, the historian does not tell us why God struck King Uzziah with leprosy. To get that information, we have to go to another historian, a book written after the exile in Babylon, 2 Chronicles 26.

I had a sermon on King Uzziah a few years ago from 2 Chronicles 26. After so much good happened to King Uzziah, he became prideful and decided he did not have to humble himself before the God of heaven. To be specific, King Uzziah decided that he could burn incense on the altar of incense in the temple of God. The problem was that God had specifically given that responsibility to the family of Aaron, the Levites, and King Uzziah was from the wrong tribe. Azariah was the priest and with 80 other priests, they opposed King Uzziah for sinning against God so King Uzziah got angry at the priests for correcting him and that’s when God struck King Uzziah with leprosy. Because he had leprosy, King Uzziah was never allowed to enter into the temple of God ever again. The prophet Isaiah also tried to encourage King Uzziah to serve the Lord faithfully. Whether King Uzziah ever repented of his arrogance, we do not know. The text never informs us.

The story of King Jeroboam II is also told in 1 Kings, 14:23-27. Jeroboam II reigned for 41 years, also a long time to sit on the throne. But he did evil in the eyes of Jehovah God. He followed in the sinful lifestyle of Jeroboam I who was instrumental in splitting the nation of Israel. But, even Jeroboam II did some good for Israel, providing some defense for them. Verse 25 of that text tells us that Jonah preached during the reign of King Jeroboam II.

It is significant that Amos preached during this period of time because this is about 30 years before the Assyrian nation invades northern Israel and carries God’s people into exile in Assyria and the Assyrians move other conquered peoples into northern Israel and these people intermarry with the poor Israelites living in the land and this leads to God’s word being further diluted and further ignored among many of God’s people. There were only two kings over Israel from King Jeroboam until the Assyrian exile.

This gives us some background into Amos’ day and time. Now, for some background on Amos. Notice in 1:1 that Amos says he was a shepherd in the village of Tekoa. Tekoa was ten miles south of Jerusalem. In other words, Amos was not a “full-time” prophet and he was not among the prophets who lived either in Samaria, the capital of Israel, or in Jerusalem, the capital of Judah. He was a “nobody” from a small village who would have been easy to ignore. In chapter 7, a priest from Bethel, which was a hotspot for paganism in Israel, tried to get King Jeroboam to exile Amos from the land. Amos responded by saying (in essence), “You know. I was minding my own business, keeping my sheep and collecting figs to sell and feed my family, and the word of the Lord came to me and told me to prophesy against Israel!” (7:10-17).

So, Amos was a little bit of a reluctant preacher and when God speaks, man must hear and obey. So, Amos goes to his fellowman, his fellow Israelite, and he preaches to him God’s word. What does Amos have to say that is relevant for Christians today?

THE LION ROARS AGAINST THE NATIONS - (chapter 1):
In verse 2, Amos pictures God as a lion, roaring His anger from the heart of the Jewish nation, from Jerusalem. First, Amos shares God’s wrath against the nations around Israel:

1. First, Amos rebukes the city of Damascus (1:3-5) and the nation of Syria (or “Aram” as some translations translate it), for their violent behavior toward Gilead, in Israel.

God also calls on us to be “kind” toward others. One aspect of the fruit of the Spirit is kindness (Gal. 5:22). “Kindness” is love in action. “Kindness” is treating others the way you want to be treated. When I am dealing with someone who has rubbed me the wrong way, my “default” response is sarcasm. While I would not say that sarcasm is never appropriate (even the prophets of God used sarcasm sometimes, as did NT writers like Paul), I don’t think it should be a “default” response. Our default response ought to be kindness: “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you” (Eph. 4:32). Certainly, this applies both to friends and enemies.

2. Secondly, Amos rebukes the nation of Philistia (1:6-8) because they deported an entire population into Edom. In other words, they had no respect for people’s home, their culture, their way of life.

I had a sermon just a few weeks ago on racism and I won’t repeat that sermon here. But we need to learn to respect different peoples’ cultures and their own traditions. The only traditions and cultural practices that are wrong are those which are sinful, those which violate the word of God. When we lived in Romania and we had Americans visiting us, I told them that they would see things in Romania which seemed wrong and out of place. We often thought, “Why do Romanians do that? It’s so dumb; it’s such a waste.” I said and thought that until I realized this fundamental point: Romanians had more time than they had money. Americans will waste money often just to save time. We have money to throw away, in that sense. But Romanians do not have so much money. So they will go out of their way, wasting a considerable amount of time if necessary, in order to save money. Let’s not be critical of other cultures just because we don’t understand them or because they are different from ours.

3. Thirdly, Amos rebukes Tyre (1:9-10) because they, like Philistia, disrespected the nation of Edom. They did not remember the “covenant of brothers,” the basic respect that one human being owes to another. They were following the path of Philistia rather than the path of respect for others.

God warned Israel under the law of Moses that they should not follow a multitude to do evil (Exo. 23:2). We ought to be very careful that we do not get caught up in the hype on TV or in the news and do things just because everyone else is doing them! As individuals and as a congregation, we must make our decisions whether some action is right or wrong because of what the Bible says. We cannot be right with God when we allow evil companions to corrupt our good morals (1 Cor. 15:33).

4. Fourthly, Amos rebukes Edom herself (1:11-12) because she was not compassionate and acted on her own anger and fury. Notice here that just because Edom was the recipient of the mistreatment by Philistia and Tyre did not mean that God would overlook her own sins.

We might be a faithful congregation of God’s people as a whole, but that is not going to get every individual Christian who is a member here to heaven. The faithfulness of the congregation will help you get to heaven but you will be judged, I will be judged, as individuals and whether or not we have, individually, grown in our dedication to Jesus Christ since the day we were baptized. That’s why it is so important for each one of us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Peter 3:18).

5. Fifthly, Amos rebukes Ammon (1:13-15) because they ripped open pregnant women in order to enlarge their borders. Certainly, the violence and cruelty of treating pregnant women this way is a sin worthy of the strictest condemnation. But here, Ammon is doing it in order to enlarge the borders of their nation.

In other words, their covetousness, their consuming desire to have more and more and more, allowed them to engage in the most despicable acts of cruelty in order to accomplish their goal. Covetousness is greed put into action. If kindness is love put into action, covetousness is greed put into action. The NT uses and condemns covetousness some 11 times. Paul writes in Ephesians 5:5 that “no immoral or impure person or covetous man, who is an idolater, has an inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.” We need to examine our hearts and see if we are willing to enter morally-gray areas simply to make more money, buy more stuff, enrich our own bank accounts.

6. Sixthly, we move into chapter 2 as Amos continues his rebukes, this time of Moab (2:1-3). Moab mistreated Edom, just like Philistia and Tyre did, and Amos specifically rebukes their leadership.

As we all know, the bottleneck is at the top. An organization is going to be as good or as inept as its leadership. Here, we’re talking specifically to our elders, deacons, ministers, and Bible class teachers. We are all teachers and we all influence others who look to us for leadership. We ought to be very careful that Jesus Christ is our model, our standard, our guide, our inspiration. Paul warned Timothy, a preacher of the gospel, in 1 Timothy 4:16: “Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; persevere in these things, for as you do this you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you.”

7. Seventhly, Amos rebukes Judah, his own people (2:4-5), for rejecting the law of the Lord and not keeping God’s statutes.

We cannot over emphasize how important it is to obey Christ’s commandments. Obey. Obey. Obey. Because it is so important for us to obey, we need to be careful about the influences in our lives that either encourage us to obey or discourage us from obeying. Jesus is the author of eternal salvation to all those who obey Him (Heb. 5:8-9); He also says that we show our love to Him by obeying Him (John 14:15).

8. Finally, eighthly, Amos rebukes his neighbors (2:6-8), Israel, because they were abusing the poor, in particular. These people took advantage, in every way possible, of those who were less-well-off in their society. If they could twist the law to give them an upper hand against the righteous or against the poor, they did so.

Yes, we need to be thoughtful of the poor. God has given us jobs so that “performing with our own hands what is good,” we will “have something to share with one who has need” (Eph. 4:28). My life is not about me; it’s about Christ. My money is not about serving me; it’s about serving Christ. Jesus and service to Him should always be the focus of our lives and our budgets.

Once Amos gets these rebukes out of the way, he shares with Israel some blessings God had given them:

GOD’S BLESSINGS - 2:9-11:
In these three verses, notice what God had done for Israel… He destroyed the Amorite, those who dwelt in the land of Canaan, so Israel could have a land in order to prepare for the coming Messiah.

God brought Israel out of slavery in Egypt. As He led them through the wilderness for forty years, God provided for them: meat to eat, bread from heaven, and water out of rocks.

God also provided them with preachers to encourage them and share with them the message from God. The Nazirites were Israelites who had raised their own level of commitment to God, not to shame other Israelites for not having the same level of commitment, but to encourage other Israelites to raise their level of commitment to God.

Shouldn’t we often count our many blessings in order to stay faithful to God? Too often, we focus on the bad things in life and that focus distracts our hearts and minds from what God has actually given to us.

INGRATITUDE WILL BE PUNISHED - 2:12-16:
How did the Israelites, as a whole, treat the Nazirites? They made them drink wine. You remember from Numbers 6 that if an Israelite wanted to take a Nazirite vow, he was not supposed to eat or drink anything that came from the grape - strong drink, vinegar, or even fresh grapes or raisins. But somehow, the Israelites were not respecting that vow and were enticing Nazirites to break their vows to God.

The Israelites of Amos’s day were also trying to keep prophets from preaching the word of God. Amos was stepping on too many toes and the Israelites did not like that.

But God will not let this behavior go unpunished. He will weigh them down (vs 13). They will not be able to flee or fight their way out of God’s judgment (vs 14). The bow, the runner, or the horse will not save them (vs 15). Even the brave will not be able to escape the wrath of God (vs 16).

If you and I really are thankful to God for our material blessings and our spiritual blessings, it is going to show in our behavior. We’ll worship God and we’ll serve through His church to the best of our ability in order to help Jesus accomplish His goals - the building up of the Swartz Creek church of Christ to bring honor to God and glory to Jesus Christ. It all begins with thankfulness to God.

Message #3 from Amos is…

WITH GREAT POWER COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY - chapter 3:
Those of you who are Marvel comics fans will probably recognize that quote as coming from the story of Spiderman. But, I think it is a biblical principle as well…

Notice what Amos says in chapter 3. God brought the entire family of Abraham out of Egypt (vs 1). God chose Israel out of all the families of the earth (vs 2). But, since Israel has sinned against God, she will not escape punishment (vs 2).

God cannot walk with Israel unless they are in agreement (vs 3).

A lion roars after it catches its prey (vs 4). A bird falls into a trap after it grabs the bait (vs 5). A trap springs after it captures something. A people tremble after the war trumpet sounds (vs 6). A calamity happens in a city after God causes it.

What’s the point? There is a cause-and-effect relationship with sin. If we sin, it brings judgment. And this is not done unexpectedly nor secretly. God has revealed His counsel to His servants the prophets (vs 7) so there is no excuse for disobedience. If God speaks, we must prophesy (vs 8).

So, because Israel was not being obedient to Jehovah God, God promises the Assyrian exile in verse 12. Israel will be punished. The rest of chapter 3 emphasizes that God is bringing punishment on His own children for disobedience to His word.

As Christians, you and I know that with great power comes great responsibility. We know the word of God; if not, we are obligated to learn the word of God. Then we are obligated to teach the Word of God and live it out in our lives. Just because we are Christians does not mean we have our ticket punched to heaven. We still must live faithful lives to Jesus Christ every single day.

Take home message: Amos’s message for his people is still relevant for Christians today. God does not walk with us unless we agree (in word and in action) with His Message.