Day 192—We are in the SEVENTH month of Bible reading. Praise God! Today we read in another of the “minor prophets.”

    Day 192 – Amos 1 – 5. (Judgment on Israel and her surrounding nations)

The northern kingdom of Israel, under the rule of its evil kings, has become fat, proud, and merciless.  

God sends Amos from Judah to pronounce judgment on Israel in the days of King Jeroboam the 2nd for their idol worship and their lack of justice and cruelty to the poor. 

Interestingly, God’s judgments by Amos begin with the nations around Israel, but they circle closer and closer to the center of the “target,” His own people.

Amos uses the verbal device “for three transgressions, and for four, I will punish.”  It means their “cup of iniquity” was full at #3, overflowing at #4, and ripe for judgment.

       Damascus (Syria). God will punish and send fire to the houses of Hazael and Ben-hadad for their cruelty and greed.

       Gaza (Ashdod, Ashkelon, Ekron: the Philistines). God will devour their strongholds and cut off the people and kings, and they will perish because they delivered God’s people to Edom.

       Tyre. God will also send fire to this country and devour them for their betraying God’s people to Edom.

       Edom. The second, closer circle begins now. God’s anger was against Edom for pursuing God’s own people with the sword and without mercy.

       Ammonites. God also will send fire, devastation, and exile on them for their cruelty and greed.

       Moabites. The same as with Ammon. But Moab “will die amid uproar.” God will cut off its king and all the princes.

       Judah.  Even the southern kingdom of Judah, God’s own people, does not escape judgment.  But their sin is worse. “They have rejected the law of the LORD and not kept His statutes.” Fire and destruction will devour Judah and Jerusalem.

       And finally, Amos comes to Israel.

God will judge them for the selfish way they’ve treated the poor and needy while living rich in their own homes. They have profaned God’s holy name by incest and sexual sin.

God lists all the good He has done for Israel, but they turned and despised Him.  And so, God will “press them down in their place, make them inadequate to fight enemies, fearful enough to flee away naked.” 

God’s heart was toward them. “You only, have I known of all the families of the earth…”   “Therefore… and adversary shall surround the land and bring down your defenses, and your strongholds shall be plundered.”

Amos tells them, “The LORD has sworn by his holiness that the days are coming upon you when they shall take you away with hooks.”

God reminds them of all the past warnings he sent them, yet “you did not return to me.”  And now, the verdict has come.  “Therefore this I will do to you, O Israel…. prepare to meet your God.”

He pleads with them, “Seek me and live.”  “Seek the LORD and live.”   “Seek good and not evil that you may live; Hate evil and love good, and establish justice in the gate; it may be that the LORD, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”

But they do not turn, and the LORD says, “I will send you into exile beyond Damascus.” (the Assyrians)