We will not always make friends by speaking Truth—Words that God says to say through us.  Even those in our family who say they love us will raise eyebrows when you stand for what God says in His Word as the way to please God with our lives. “What credentials do you have to speak to us this way” is the retort.  “Who are you to say anything about right living when you have sinned yourself?”  Like the blind man who was healed by Jesus; “I don’t know how He did it, all I know is once I was blind and now I see”.

It seems Amos has the same problem.  God has given Amos, the shepherd farmer a message along with a vision of what will happen to the “house of Jacob”, Israel, if they do not turn back to God.  Amos has the courage to beg for his ancestry’s deliverance and God says he will spare them if they will turn back to Him.  But they do not.   Amos is confronted with a high priest official who does not want the “bad news” to be heard and works to squash the Truth.  But God takes care of Amos.  God’s truth is heard and administered just as He said.  As the for Truth-Squasher, Amaziah…Well, he died homeless. 

It seems Jesus, the Person of Truth, “the Word made flesh”, went through the same challenges as He told the Truth of God to those in charge of God’s Temple work.  So, we when speak Jesus, we will experience the same challenges.  People want to remain the same, doing the same, without thought for tomorrow.  But tomorrow will come and many will not be ready.

Amos 7, The Message

To Die Homeless and Friendless

^1-2 God, my Master, showed me this vision: He was preparing a locust swarm. The first cutting, which went to the king, was complete, and the second crop was just sprouting. The locusts ate everything green. Not even a blade of grass was left.

I called out, “God, my Master! Excuse me, but what’s going to come of Jacob? He’s so small.”

³ God gave in.

“It won’t happen,” he said.

* * *

⁴ God showed me this vision: Oh! God, my Master God was calling up a firestorm. It burned up the ocean. Then it burned up the Promised Land.

⁵ I said, “God, my Master! Hold it—please! What’s going to come of Jacob? He’s so small.”

⁶ God gave in.

“All right, this won’t happen either,” God, my Master, said.

* * *

⁷ God showed me this vision: My Master was standing beside a wall. In his hand he held a plumb line.

^8-9 God said to me, “What do you see, Amos?”

I said, “A plumb line.”

Then my Master said, “Look what I’ve done. I’ve hung a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel. I’ve spared them for the last time. This is it!

    “Isaac’s sex-and-religion shrines will be smashed,
    Israel’s unholy shrines will be knocked to pieces.
    I’m raising my sword against the royal family of Jeroboam.”

¹⁰ Amaziah, priest at the shrine at Bethel, sent a message to Jeroboam, king of Israel:

“Amos is plotting to get rid of you; and he’s doing it as an insider, working from within Israel. His talk will destroy the country. He’s got to be silenced. Do you know what Amos is saying?

¹¹     ‘Jeroboam will be killed.
    Israel is headed for exile.’”

^12-13 Then Amaziah confronted Amos: “Seer, be on your way! Get out of here and go back to Judah where you came from! Hang out there. Do your preaching there. But no more preaching at Bethel! Don’t show your face here again. This is the king’s chapel. This is a royal shrine.”

^14-15 But Amos stood up to Amaziah: “I never set up to be a preacher, never had plans to be a preacher. I raised cattle and I pruned trees. Then God took me off the farm and said, ‘Go preach to my people Israel.’

^16-17 “So listen to God’s Word. You tell me, ‘Don’t preach to Israel. Don’t say anything against the family of Isaac.’ But here’s what God is telling you:

    Your wife will become a whore in town.
    Your children will get killed.
    Your land will be auctioned off.
    You will die homeless and friendless.
    And Israel will be hauled off to exile, far from home.”

WHAT DO WE LEARN—HOW DO WE RESPOND?

Amos saw God’s coming judgments on Israel through five visions. After each vision, he prayed that God would be merciful.

God sent his prophet Amos to warn the people of Israel to repent of their sins. God gives us these examples to teach us that he hates sin. And he promised a Savior who would save us from our sins—Jesus!

When Jesus breathed his last breath on earth, Matthew tells us the NOON day sky grew dark as night!  It covered the entire earth where Jesus hung on that cross for our sins.  “From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land” (Matthew 27:45)  This is a supernatural darkness. Not a casual gathering of clouds or a brief eclipse of the sun. This is a three-hour blanket of blackness.

Of course, the sky is dark; people are killing the light of the world.

Because of all the sins of the world (yours and mine) placed upon his shoulders, God turned his back from His Son because God cannot be where sin is.  God and sin cannot occupy the same space.  The Savior no one understands pierces the darkness with heaven’s loneliest question: “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” (Matthew 27:46 NCV).

In this hour Jesus is anything but righteous. But his mistakes aren’t his own. “Christ carried our sins in his body on the cross so we would stop living for sin and start living for what is right” (1Peter 2:24 NCV).

Christ carried all our sins in his body.

Take a moment and meditate on the truth that Jesus carried your sins in his body that day when he died a horrible death on the cross—abandoned by God because of our sin. Thank him for his astonishing love.

Then on that Third Day, Christ arose!  He went to hell and back again for us, defeated death, removed our sins forever, and lives today.  God, Son and Holy Spirit back together again and forever! This victorious act of love, mercy, and grace opens the doors of heaven to all who believe, call on His Name, and repent of their sins! 

Our Hope has risen and we will live forever with Him.  Hope gives us a reason to get up every morning and praise the One and Only who set us free!  THIS is the Truth. 

AND Jesus is coming back…How do you feel about that?  Ready or not, here He comes!

And I’m singing my prayer today…by Keith Green…There is a Redeemer…

… There is a redeemer
Jesus, God’s own Son
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah
Holy One

… Jesus my redeemer
Name above all names
Precious Lamb of God, Messiah
Oh, for sinners slain

… Thank you, oh my father
For giving us Your Son
And leaving Your Spirit
‘Til the work on Earth is done

… When I stand in Glory
I will see His face
And there I’ll serve my King forever
In that Holy Place

… Thank you, oh my father
For giving us Your Son
And leaving Your Spirit
‘Til the work on Earth is done…

Thank you, dear Jesus, Amen!

Soon and very soon,
We are going to see the King,
Soon and very soon,
We are going to see the King.
Soon and very soon,
We are going to see the King,
Hallelujah, hallelujah,
We are going to see the King!

(By Andrea Crouch)