09: Minor Prophets - Amos 1:1-3:7

[Dunkle] Welcome to Minor Prophets class as we come back together again. We finished the Book of Joel last time, and we were being more speedy than I expected, and sometimes it just happens that way. So today we're beginning the Book of Amos. So the third of the Minor Prophets. So as we do, as we start a new book, we want to have some background, and we'll do that by covering the five W's of Amos. So we start off, who wrote the Book of Amos?

Well, Amos. One thing that's interesting about this Amos—I shouldn't say this Amos perhaps, because there's no other mention of anyone else by that name in the Bible. And that's kind of unusual. There are several Joels, and there's a number of Micahs and such.

Only one Amos. It's an unusual name in the Hebrew. It means burden. Like you're carrying a heavy burden. And it makes me wonder, because it's not uncommon for a messenger from God to mention that he has a burden from the Lord. So the job he has to do to bring the message is a burden. Leading some people to wonder if that's actually a title more than his actual name.

But right now I've told you as much as, at least as much as I know about it, and probably as much as others. We do know a little bit more about Amos than some of the others, because he tells us about his occupation. He describes himself in chapter 7 as a sheep breeder. Now, some people say that means he's a shepherd. He's herding, but shepherds might also breed. And it says that he's someone who tends to sycamore fruit.

Sycamore fruit is something I'm not very familiar with, because I live not that far from Sycamore Park here outside of Batavia, and those trees don't have fruit on them that I've ever seen.

But most scholars think it's referring to what was called a sycamore fig, a type of fig that grew in the Middle East. And what's interesting is these figs tended to be small, and they say they would ripen best if somebody punched a small hole in them while they were in their development. That seems really odd to me, but I don't know much about figs.

So I will say, though, that fits some of what we know, because Amos is from Tekoa. So when we talk about the where, we'll say he's from Tekoa, which is about 15 miles southeast of Jerusalem, which clearly is in the kingdom of Judah.

But shepherds would move around sometimes, and sycamore figs, what we think they were describing, grew in the area of Galilee and north of Jerusalem. So theoretically—this is a little speculation—but some shepherds, we believe, would move their flocks up there where there would be more rain and better pasture. And owners of land would agree, okay, I'll let you bring your sheep here if you spend some of your time poking holes in these figs so they'll ripen properly.

So that explains him later saying, look, I was not a prophet. I'm a sheep breeder and a tender of sycamore fruit. Many people think, okay, you can keep an eye on the sheep. It's their nap time. Go at the sycamore fruit. Poke the holes in them. I find that intriguing because you don't see it elsewhere in the Bible.

Okay, let's talk about the when. Okay, this one we can be fairly specific. It does tell us that it's in the days of Uzziah, king of Judah, and the days of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, king of Israel. We know some about these. Jeroboam in Israel was the one we say Jeroboam II. The first king of the northern kingdom when they separated was Jeroboam I. Jeroboam II came many years later. And this was a time of prosperity.

We can get even more precise because he says it's two years before the earthquake. Now, as he writes that, it's, well, you know, a couple years before the earthquake. You know the earthquake, right? Well, those of us here don't necessarily, but our good friend Josephus, the Jewish historian, mentions that earthquake, and he pins it down to what we would call 751 B.C.

So, 751 B.C., if that's when the earthquake was, two years before that—because we're on the negative side of the number line—is 753 B.C.

So we think the prophecy probably started at least around 753 B.C. Now how does he know? Well, I'll just comment. Obviously he's writing later, because he can say this happened two years before the earthquake, but he has to have known the earthquake happened.

It's like if—well, I was going to say I'm trying to think of a bad example. I'm trying to think of a good example, but one that came to mind that might not be great—is if I said, you know, the Bengals drafted Joe Burrow in the year such and so forth. And you say, you know… that’s hopeful thinking maybe. Well, for me to say it happened five years before they won the Super Bowl, I have to be writing after they won the Super Bowl.

So what I'm getting at is he's describing some events and citing an earlier date when he must have written it down later to know that something happened later. And to be honest, that doesn't matter a whole lot to us. But scholars who have a lot of time on their hands—or they're trying to get their degree by publishing a dissertation—will focus in on this type of thing.

What I would emphasize is it's during the reign of Jeroboam II, which was a prosperous time in the northern kingdom. They were doing well. Life seemed great, but they weren't worshiping God. And so they come in for a lot of criticism through the prophets telling them about their sins and warning them of punishment to come. And that's not all that many years before the Assyrian conquest will come.

So I'm going to move on to where, and we've already covered some of these things. Much of this prophecy, we believe, is focused at the northern kingdom, even though we see that Amos is from Judah. There's a mention in chapter 7 of him being at Bethel. And he's actually told, get out of here. I don't want you to be in Bethel.

So I find that intriguing because it sounds almost like he lives down here. He comes up to Bethel, pronounces his prophecy, is told, get out of here, and he turns around and leaves. Maybe that's how it happened.

It seems that much of what he wrote—his writing might have been done down in Tekoa where he lives—but we know he did go up there to Bethel and make a public proclamation.

Which might remind you—well, if you're thinking of a story—after the first Jeroboam separated the northern kingdom, God did send a prophet to Bethel to condemn him. And he was supposed to just say his message and then leave without stopping, without eating or drinking anything. And he got into trouble because a bad prophet convinced him to come in to have a meal with him, and God allowed a lion to kill him.

That's an aside. I'm just saying we could see a parallel, except Amos doesn't disobey God and everything goes well.

Let's get focused again. Let's talk about the what of Amos.

Amos seems to be largely a prophecy of immediate warning about sin and its results. So it's that warning—with, very importantly, a call to repent. I mentioned when we were introducing Hosea that its focus is on God's unfailing love. Here we have less of that and more on the importance of repenting.

So this is less about God and more about what God wants from His people and what God is pointing out to His people that they're doing wrong. There is some end-time prophecy, not nearly as much as we saw in the book of Joel.

Now let me borrow from Hebrew scholars who can read the Hebrew and appreciate the poetry. They say that Amos’ writing is characterized by beauty of expression, lofty thought.

Some of that comes through in English, I believe. There are some beautiful expressions, lofty thoughts. They say his parallelisms are exact. Remember, parallelism is like the idea of rhyming ideas rather than rhyming sounds. So in essence, he's a shepherd, but he's a good poet. His poetry is good, and his descriptions are called detailed.

Now, they say he uses an energetic style, I like that, and many descriptions from nature. So he's a shepherd, he spends time outdoors. There's one place that sticks in my mind. He describes the weight of Israel's sins like a cart full of sheaves. So somebody who's on the farm thinks of, okay, how heavy is a cart full of sheaves? You know, sheaves of grain that are abundant. Okay, that's the way he's describing it. So you'll get that with Amos.

While we're talking about the what, I'll mention something particular about the first two chapters. The first two chapters use a literary device to pronounce judgment on eight different nations. And I was going to write the eight different nations, but I ran out of time. But I want to make the point that five of those eight are interrelated.

So I'll quickly mention that the nations are Damascus, or we could say Samir. Some may... I can't say it. We could say Syria, which Damascus is the capital. Then Philistia, or the Philistine cities. Then Tyre, the chief Phoenician city. Then we get down to the relatives. Edom, Ammon, Moab, Judah, and Israel.

And there I wanted to show up the family tree. We know Abraham had a brother named Haran, who doesn't feature in the story in Genesis, but Haran's son Lot does. Lot is Abraham's nephew. He has two sons, Moab and Ammon, who give rise to the kingdoms of Moab and Ammon. So there are two kingdoms on the east of Israel that are related.

Of course, Abraham had the sons Isaac and Ishmael. Ishmael is generally thought to be the father of the Arabic peoples, who may or may not feature in some of these nations, but I wouldn't say specifically among the eight that are condemned. Isaac has two sons, Jacob and Esau, they're twins. Esau becomes the father of the nation of Edom, Edom which will be located mostly to the south of Israel, or Judah if we're being particular. So it's another relative.

Jacob gives rise to... well, his name changes to Israel, but through his twelve sons, he's the forefather of the two kingdoms, Israel and Judah. So, since this is during the divided monarchy, we'll separate them. So what I'm getting at, again, five of the eight kingdoms whom God calls into account are related in one way or another.

And I mentioned a literary device. You can see it if you've got your Bible open to Amos. In verse 3 it says, “For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 1:3).

That same wording follows through for all eight. For three transgressions of whoever it is, Edom, Moab, Ammon. Three transgressions, and for four I will not turn away. This seems to be implying repeated sin. Okay? It's an interesting literary device, not necessarily proclaiming a specific number of sins. God isn't saying, oh, forgive three times and number four, blam, here it comes. You have it. That's not what God means. 

What He's saying, it's, should I say, a cliché, a figure of speech. In English we might sometimes say, if I told you once, I told you a million times. Does anybody say that anymore? Maybe there are similar examples. That's the kind of thing that we're going to see.

We'll also see a number of times that God promises to send a fire. Okay? Most commentators believe fire here is symbolic of war. It's not a literal fire. It's not like the wildfires we keep hearing about in California, and the ones in Canada that send us their smoke regularly. Not all of Canada, but... So, fire is a common punishment, but probably that's a symbol for war.

We'll get into that fairly soon, because I've only got one more W, and then we'll get into that explanation of that literary device. But let's focus on the why. Why interrelates with what? But it's largely to warn of the results of sin. Okay? You're sinning. This is what's going to happen. But repent. The call for repentance. Many times God calls for repentance, and then He will give time. Maybe people will repent.

As we were going through Joel, I mentioned, when man will repent, God will relent. Sometimes God is saying, look, you're doing this sin, this is what it's going to bring, but it doesn't have to be that way. You don't have to suffer. You can turn. And that's where it makes me think many of these could be described even as cause and effect prophecies. Cause and effect. It's not saying, after so many years, this is going to happen. Rather, it's saying, when people do this, this other thing happens as a result.

I could say here in the classroom, if you stay up till 3.30 a.m., you might have trouble staying awake in class the next day. Cause and effect. Boy, I wish people on the camera could see the faces of the students when I said that. I just pulled 3.30 a.m. just out of the air. I didn't know anything. But I was once 19 years old.

Okay, let's come into it. So we covered chapter one, giving us some of the five W's. So in chapter—did I say chapter one? We're in chapter one, but I meant verse one.

We move into verse two. “The Lord roars from Zion, and utters His voice from Jerusalem” (Amos 1:2).

When we were going through the last part of Joel, I mentioned that the same language appears here. So back in “The Lord also will roar from Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem” (Joel 3:16), God was roaring there primarily against Israel's enemies. Here, including Israel and its neighbors for their own sins.

So God can liken Himself to a powerful, roaring lion. And that's scary. Can't help but think of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, where the lion can be representative of God. I'll confess, I didn't get this. I remember when Micah Gunn was here, he pointed out some of... now my mind's going blank for the writer. C. S. Lewis. Thank you. I knew that.

But I think somewhere he mentioned they're talking in the imagery of the lion coming. They say, you know, something like, is it safe? No, he's not safe. He's dangerous, but he's good. And I like that line. Even though I don't read a lot of C. S. Lewis.

Yeah, God is not a kitten. He has power. He expects to be obeyed, but he's good. And of course we want to add merciful and patient and loving.

But getting back to this, the Lord roars from Zion, utters His voice from Jerusalem. So Zion often represents the Church. Here we've got the reference to Jerusalem as well. So God has His chosen people that He's working with.

“The Lord roars from Zion, and utters His voice from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds mourn, and the top of Carmel withers” (Amos 1:2).

“The pastures of the shepherds mourn, and the top of Carmel withers” (Amos 1:2). Some anthropomorphism there.

And then we get into this literary device. “For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 1:3).

As I said before, this isn't saying that Damascus has now crossed the line and God won't forgive It's like I said, a literary device, but it represents repeated sin. Okay, you've sinned over and over and over again, and now there's punishment. He says, I won't turn away its punishment.

And by the way, as I mentioned, Damascus is up here. It's representing the entire kingdom, we believe. So it's not just the city, but Syria seems to be represented.

One of the things it says they did at the latter part of verse three is “they threshed Gilead with implements of iron.” Okay, you might say, well, having iron tools for harvesting is great, but what this seems to be referring to is Gilead is part of this land that God gave to Israel.

When Moses led Israel up and they conquered the peoples on the Transjordan and later settled there with Reuben, Gad, and half Manasseh. So Gilead is that land, and Syria over centuries kept trying to take that land. So that's what this is referring to. Syria is guilty of trying to take away the promised land that God gave to Israel, and so it's going to bring punishment. So I'm not going to turn away its punishment.

Instead, verse four says, “But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael” (Amos 1:4).

Hazael was a particular king of Israel. He's mentioned in the historical account. You can find him in... let me slow that down. You can find him in 2 Kings chapter 10 verses 32 and 33. A lot of Bibles will have that reference in their center margin.

So he's in 2 Kings 10:32–33, also 2 Kings 13 starting in verse 3. It's not important here. I just want you to realize that he's bringing up that name because it's relevant.

Similarly, the palaces of Ben-Hadad. Ben-Hadad was the son of Hazael. So we've got two of the kings of Syria mentioned who are going to be punished. And God says, “I will also break the gate bar of Damascus, and cut off the inhabitant from the Valley of Aven” (Amos 1:5).

Scholars have some ideas that that could be a literal valley somewhere in the country of Syria that could be found today. But it's not certain. Some people wonder about the play on words because Aven itself can mean vanity or nothingness or waste. And that'll come up a little bit later.

But also Beth Eden, people of Syria, shall go captive to Kir. I'm not going to point at the map, but Kir, K-I-R, was a province of Assyria. So when he says you're going to go captive there, it seems to be referring to the time when the Assyrian army comes in from the north and conquers all of these kingdoms, and they will deport many of the peoples.

We're very familiar with the fact that the northern kingdom Israel was taken away and they never came back. They weren't the only peoples taken away. Judah, notably, was not taken away. And that's a very significant story when we get to Isaiah, where we see Isaiah spreading a letter in front of God's altar and praying to God, and God sends an angel to destroy an Assyrian army. But a lot of countries didn't fare so well. So here we see a lot of Syrians. They're taken captive.

Let me turn the page and move on. I want to skim over this, addressing the nations surrounding Israel. Although this gave me occasion to think of something I meant to say earlier, but neglected.

And that's that many of the prophets will include warnings to other nations besides Israel and Judah, especially the major prophets, the ones that have more space. So it's not uncommon at all for God to use His prophet to say, hey, Edom, you're going to be in trouble. Moab, I'm going to punish you. Tyre, Sidon, you're going to be punished. That's not unordant. That's not uncommon. Out of the ordinary. Say it in English.

The one thing that is out of the ordinary is that Amos puts it up front.

In the other books, you find it later on, generally. So Ezekiel will say a whole lot to Israel and then later near the end of the book say, oh, by the way, these other nations, I'm going to punish Egypt. I'm going to punish Assyria. Amos is unique in presenting this right at the start. And I'll be honest, I have no explanation for why he does so, other than to say that's the way God inspired it.

Let's look to verse 6.

Thus says the Lord, “For three transgressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 1:6).

Okay, Gaza is one of the Philistine cities, and it seems to represent all of the Philistines. And of course they're right here in this coastal area. Within this section of Scripture you'll see verse 8 mentions Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Ekron. So of the five Philistine cities, four are named. Gath is not, and that seems to be because Judah had conquered Gath before this time. So Gath is a big enemy during the time of the Judges and Saul, but later on it had been conquered by the Jews, so it's not really part of this.

Now it says they took captive the captivity. And that seems to be referring to taking advantage of those who are affected by warfare, perhaps refugees fleeing an invading army, or those who the army enslaved and now they're selling to peoples on the coast, seafaring peoples.

God is saying that's not cool. You shouldn't take advantage of your neighbors' misfortune. You should have been helping them. So I'm not going to comment more in depth, but God promises punishment.

Verse 7, “But I will send a fire upon the wall of Gaza, which shall devour its palaces” (Amos 1:7).

Again, probably war, probably when the Assyrian army comes in. “I will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and the one who holds the scepter from Ashkelon; I will turn My hand against Ekron, and the remnant of the Philistines shall perish” (Amos 1:8). Okay, pretty rough.

Verse 9, next one up on the chopping block.

“For three transgressions of Tyre, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 1:9).

Okay, again Tyre is on the seacoast. It's a prominent Phoenician city. They're known often as Sea Peoples, because although they don't live on the sea, they're on the land, they're on the coast, and they do sail. They make a lot of their money by commerce, and they've established colonies throughout the Mediterranean.

In fact, history says Tyre itself was a colony of the older city Sidon. But Tyre became greater, and so it can represent probably all the Phoenician peoples.

What did they do wrong?

Well, it says they delivered the whole captivity to Edom (Amos 1:9). So they're doing something similar to the Philistines.

They're taking advantage of their neighbors who are being taken captive. But it also mentions at the end of verse 9 they did not remember the covenant of brotherhood. “Because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and did not remember the covenant of brotherhood” (Amos 1:9).

Covenant of brotherhood. That sounds like something from a medieval movie with the knights or something.

But we know of a particular covenant that was made with Tyre and Israel. That's pretty clear. It starts in 1 Kings 5. There was an alliance and a cooperation between King Hiram of Tyre and first King David, later David's son Solomon.

And Solomon in particular—you see, I believe it's in First Kings chapter 9—he contacts Hiram and says, hey, we're going to build this temple. And you guys are very skilled. No one could cut timber like the people of Tyre. So you send your guys into the forest. I'll send workers to help them cut the timber for the temple, send it down, and we'll provide you food.

And then later Solomon gives Hiram a number of cities in northern Israel. And it turns out he doesn't like them. But I'm not going to talk about that. I'll leave that for Mr. Robinson when he gets there.

So there was a covenant, a brotherhood, you know, an alliance of cooperation and trade. But here there's a mention that they didn't remember it. You know, they took advantage of their neighbors Israel.

And so, verse 10, “But I will send a fire” (Amos 1:10).

Again, there's no record of a wildfire consuming all these nations. We're pretty confident it represents war. When the Assyrians came in, they overran about everything.

Now in verse 11 we get into family. “For three transgressions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment, because he pursued his brother” (Amos 1:11).

Remember, Esau was the brother of Jacob. The individual people—you know, the man Jacob and the man Esau—were at odds at times. And Jacob set himself up for that.

He basically swindled his brother out of his birthright. Then he went and lied to his father and stole the blessing, and Esau wanted to kill him. We know later on they reconciled. Maybe because God blessed them both with tremendous wealth and success.

But their descendants didn't get along. We see a long record in Scripture of animosity, even though God commanded Israel to treat Edom as a brother.

When the Israelites are... let's see if I can go to a different map. Yeah. The Israelites had been wandering in the wilderness. And when after the 40 years are done, they're ready to come up to Israel. Edom is pretty nasty about it. He said, no, you can't come through. So Israel goes all the way around. We remember that.

But God tells Moses, I'm not giving you Edom's land. I'm not one foot of it. So go around.

So you could say, yeah, God had Israel treat Edom like a brother, but at times Edom didn't return the favor.

And it says, partway through verse 11, “And did cast off all pity; his anger tore perpetually, and he kept his wrath forever” (Amos 1:11).

So they carried a grudge. I'm going to get those guys down through the generations. And there will be a punishment.

Verse 12, “But I will send a fire upon Teman” (Amos 1:12).

Once again, war upon Teman. Teman was a large Edomite city. And it was named for one of Esau's grandsons, his oldest grandson. So there was a man named Teman and later a city by that name.

“Likewise, I'll devour the palaces of Bozrah.” Bozrah was a major fortification within the territory of Edom. So God's calling out particular geographic places. These ones are going to be destroyed.

Let's move on. Well, we can go a little more quickly.

Verse 13, “For three transgressions of the people of Ammon” (Amos 1:13).

Now this is particularly gruesome. It says, “Because they ripped open the women with child in Gilead, that they might enlarge their territory” (Amos 1:13).

Once again, we're talking about Gilead is this territory in the Transjordan that God gave to Israel, but Ammon wanted to take it. And in the warfare this is saying they were particularly vicious. We could call this wartime atrocities. Bad enough you're killing people. You're killing pregnant women and their babies. I don't want to dwell on it. It's just a gruesome picture.

So in verse 14, “But I will kindle a fire in the wall of Rabbah,” (Amos 1:14).

Rabbah was one of the major cities of Ammon. Some scholars think it's the same city that now is Amman, Jordan. And it might be. I don't think we have to know for sure, but we know Rabbah was a major city. Amman is now.

“And it shall devour its palaces, amid shouting in the day of battle,” And “their king shall go into captivity” (Amos 1:15).

So Ammon will be punished. They practiced unusual cruelty. And by the way, again, against family members. Let me cover one more and then I'll make a point.

So going into chapter 2, we've got “For three transgressions of Moab, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 2:1).

“Because he burned the bones of the king of Edom to lime” (Amos 2:1).

So I'll send a fire on Moab. Moab is guilty of practicing atrocities against Edom. So God's not only punishing for being cruel to Israel. He's going to punish them for being cruel to other peoples.

“But I will send a fire upon Moab, and it shall devour the palaces of Kerioth; Moab shall die with tumult” (Amos 2:2).

So Kerioth, another city that's mentioned. “And I will cut off the judge” (Amos 2:3).

So this general punishment is going to come. And we've circled all around Israel and Judah. Now we're going to come to them.

It's worth noting, though, what are the sins of these other nations that are not Israel and Judah? For what are they being punished? Cruelty, lack of loyalty, taking advantage of others. We could note that there are crimes against nature or crimes against conscience. God doesn't punish Moab and Ammon and Edom or Tyre and Philistia for idolatry. He doesn't punish them for not obeying His law. They didn't know His law.

So the point I want to make now is, as we get to Judah, there's a higher level of accountability. And God is going to make that very clear.

So in verse 4 He says, “For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment, because they have despised the law of the Lord, and have not kept His commandments” (Amos 2:4).

Okay, that's an entirely different level than the others. Okay, God gave them the law. He had a higher expectation. Reminds me, I'll reference without turning there, but something Jesus Christ said. 

In Luke 12, verse 48, Jesus said, “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required” (Luke 12:48).

We're out of context here, but I don't want to miss the chance to remind you. I often call that the Ben Parker scripture. Usually faces light up when I mention Ben Parker. Ben Parker was Peter Parker's uncle. With great power must come great responsibility.

I think Stan Lee got that from the Bible. I can't prove it, but God says, “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required” (Luke 12:48).

And to bring it back to Amos, Judah, I gave you the law, and I'm going to punish you for not keeping it, turning away from My commandments. I'm not punishing Moab and Edom for those things, but I gave you more. I expect more.

In verse 5, “But I will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem” (Amos 2:5).

There we go. Then we go into Israel.

Verse 6, “For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment” (Amos 2:6).

They're also going to be held to a higher standard, because “they sell the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of sandals” (Amos 2:6).

He doesn't specifically say His law, but He expects them, having had the law, to know better. This is talking about cheapness of life. You're going to sell people just for possessions. And life isn't valued.

“They pant after the dust of the earth which is on the head of the poor, and pervert the way of the humble” (Amos 2:7).

At the end of verse 7 it says, “A man and his father go in to the same girl, to defile My holy name” (Amos 2:7).

That alone would be bad enough, but most scholars of that era believe this is talking about ritual prostitution. The temples of the pagan gods often had temple prostitutes, and so an act of worship would be for men to come and have relations with those prostitutes, and even a father and son going to the same one.

As I said, that alone is obviously committing fornication and or adultery, which is terrible. But if it's also worshipping a false god, it's horrible on more than one count, and God is holding them accountable for that.

Verse 8 says, “They lie down by every altar on clothes taken in pledge” (Amos 2:8).

So the lying down on every altar seems to be referring to what I just said with the temple prostitution. Clothes taken in pledge—by the way, that's not the stuff you dust your furniture with. It's talking about taking someone's clothes as collateral for a loan. I'll loan you 20 bucks, get it back to me this week. Say I see Adam over there, and I'd say, okay, I want your hoodie until I get my 20 bucks back.

That's not cool. You don't do that. And God specifically forbade it in the law He gave to ancient Israel. It's in Exodus 22:25. God would say, if you give a loan to the poor, you can't take their clothes as collateral or as a pledge.

And He's saying Israel did that. They were wrong to do it, and He's going to hold them accountable. And God will point out that even if Israel's lost sight of the law, He's dealt with them in a special way.

“Yet it was I who destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit above and his roots beneath” (Amos 2:9). Israel is held to a higher standard because God gave them special blessings. “Whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit above and his roots beneath.”

God eliminated those peoples. Remember that the Amorites seem to have been perhaps the strongest of the Canaanite peoples that Joshua had to lead the Israelites in to fight.

God makes it clear here. It's like, you didn't destroy them. I did that for you. I gave you this land. I gave you all these blessings. It wasn't your own hand that did this. And the fruit above and the root beneath is probably talking about complete destruction. Israel fell short of removing all the Canaanites, and they remained as snares and traps. When God decided to eliminate someone, it's root and branch, so to speak.

Another one of their sins comes up in verse 11. “I raised up some of your sons as prophets, and some of your young men as Nazarites” (Amos 2:11).

The Nazarites were people set aside. And there's some question of exactly what they were set aside for, but it seems to be special service to God. And I know, I think in another class, you've covered some of the things, the restrictions on a Nazarite. Don't cut your hair. Don't touch a dead body. Don't drink wine or touch anything from the grape.

But he's saying in verse 12, “But you gave the Nazarites wine to drink, and commanded the prophets saying, ‘Do not prophesy!’” (Amos 2:12). So causing a Nazarite to drink wine was deliberately defiling him from God's service. Deliberately defiling someone. Someone who wants to serve God. So it's like, I'm not going to obey God myself, and I'm going to stop you from obeying God. That's something God condemns.

Matter of fact, I do have the scripture written down. Jesus condemned some of the lawyers and the Pharisees for exactly that. In Luke 11, verse 52, Luke 11:52, Jesus speaks to the Pharisees and He tells them, “Woe to you lawyers! For you have taken away the key of knowledge. You entered not in yourselves, and those who were entering in you hindered” (Luke 11:52).

It's like some people are trying to get close to God and learn His way, and they're stopping. They're trying to tackle Him before they can get there. It's like making a Nazarite drink wine, and God condemns that.

So coming back to Amos, after he lists some of these sins, in verse 13 he says, “Behold, I am weighed down by you, as a cart full of sheaves is weighed down” (Amos 2:13).

God's saying, this is weighing on me. This is heavy. I'm putting up with your sins, and of course whether or not God inspired Amos with this exact metaphor we can't know, but it's one Amos would be familiar with.

Therefore, verse 14, “Therefore flight shall perish from the swift, the strong shall not strengthen his power, nor shall the mighty deliver himself” (Amos 2:14). You can't get yourself out of this. Your human means are going to fail.

And that's, I'll have to say, no power of man, no talent or ability of man, is going to deliver them from the punishment that God will bring when God determines to bring it.

Now, verse 15, “He shall not stand who handles the bow, the swift of foot shall not escape, nor shall he who rides a horse deliver himself” (Amos 2:15). Riding a horse won't deliver you.

The most courageous men of might... let me say that again, verse 16. “The most courageous men of might shall flee naked in that day” (Amos 2:16). That's an intriguing visual. Probably is referring to a soldier losing his armor.

So it's not the streaking that was common in the 1970s in America, at least as far as we know. I can't say that it doesn't mean nudity, but it's most likely meaning, as I said, the mighty man loses his armor and probably weapons as well because he's fighting against God. It can't work.

Powering through. Okay, chapter 3 turns away from that literary device condemning people for their sins, and it might be a new prophetic utterance, or just a turn of thought. But it starts off chapter 3, verse 1.

“Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt” (Amos 3:1).

It's like saying, listen up. I got something to tell you. He's listed several things. Now there's something powerful. And it goes on to say, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt. All 12 tribes. I know you've separated into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, but I got something for all 12 tribes that I brought out of Egypt.

And in verse 2 he says, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth; therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities” (Amos 3:2).

This ties to what I just said in the previous chapter. God didn't punish all the other peoples for not obeying His law. He punished them for being inhumane and cruel. But you Israelites, I've known you. And by implication, you should know Me. Therefore, I'm going to punish you for your iniquities.

Okay? They were liable for punishment because God gave them the law. One of the reasons I want to emphasize that is God has given us some special privilege. You know, God could say to Israel, you only of all the nations I've known. But now He could say to those in His Church, you only of all the peoples on earth has the Father drawn.

And if Christ said, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (John 6:44), that's us.

I don't want to say you. It's us. We have a special blessing, special opportunity, and that implies special responsibility.

“For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required” (Luke 12:48).

We've been given much. And so God is calling them out. And again, let's bring the focus back to ancient Israel, keeping in mind that we want to apply these lessons to ourselves when we can. Actually, I forgot I had in my notes a reference to 1 Peter 4, verse 17.

And “For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). Judgment must begin at the house of God. So if we're the house of God, our period of judging comes now. But that's okay. God gives us His Spirit, and He leads us and helps us, so we don't have to be afraid of that. We just don't want to forget it.

Now, moving forward, I've got to address... well, I'm going to say there are several verses. Verses 3 through 6 have what I would say are a series of rhetorical questions. Now, what's a rhetorical question? It's a question you ask knowing that everybody already knows the answer. I could say, does the sun come up in the morning?

I know that you know it does, okay? So, does what goes up must come down? Of course. So, these are rhetorical questions to underline the point that... I'm going to say the point is, for every effect there's a cause. If something happens, something caused it to happen.

So, God is asking these questions like, in verse 4, “Will a lion roar in the forest when he has no prey?” (Amos 3:4). Well, of course not. Something happened to make him roar. “Will a young lion cry out of his den, if he has caught nothing?” (Amos 3:4). Will a bird fall in a snare on the earth where there is no trap for it? Does a bird suddenly... I'm stuck, I can't go anywhere. On its own? No, the trap caught him.

“If a trumpet is blown in a city, will not the people be afraid?” (Amos 3:6). People are trembling because they heard an alarm. Yeah, they sounded the trumpet. “If there is calamity in a city, will not the Lord have done it?” (Amos 3:6). Okay, calamity. It could be a fire. Let's say God could cause it or not prevent it.

Okay, there are a couple of points I want to go on this. One is that there's impending punishment that's coming because of the causes. There were all those causes, so when the punishment comes, no one should be surprised.

We could add, because he's going to talk about sending a warning by his prophets. I'll probably back up and recover some of this in our next class meeting, but in verse 7 it says, “Surely the Lord God does nothing, unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).

Okay, so God gives warning. And I bet Amos, as he's writing this down, thinking, oh, I'm it. God is giving warning through me. I'm one of the prophets. And a true servant of God can't keep the message to himself. There's cause and effect.

Having said that, I want to back up and address Amos 3, verse 3, because we've used this for a specific purpose in the Church. That is not exactly what Amos meant. And I want to choose my wording carefully, because I don't want to say we were wrong to do so, because I believe in the purpose we used it for.

And what it says is, “Can two walk together, unless they are agreed?” (Amos 3:3).

Okay, that's a good idea. Two together should be agreed. They're going to walk together. And when we say walk together, it doesn't necessarily mean walking down a path the way we've used it. It means spending your life together. As a matter of fact, if someone shout out, what have we interpreted this to mean in God's Church? You're all young adults. Well, some of you younger than others, but... yes?

[Audience Member] It means you're not married to someone who is nothing.

[Dunkle] Okay, we've used it to say, don't marry outside the Church. You're going to walk the path of life together. You need to be agreed on this. I think that's a very good idea. And I say that as someone who, when I was younger, almost married outside the Church. And I'll tell you that story later in a different class, but I'm really glad that I didn't do that. And like I said, time for another story.

But we've used this to say, yeah, that's the principle to live by. I agree with that principle, but I still think that's not what God had Amos... why God had Amos write this. And when it said the word agreed—can two walk together unless they're agreed? The word there is yah-od, often transliterated this way with a little space or a hyphen.

And it means... let me make sure I'm saying this properly... yah-od, to set an appointment. Can two walk together unless they've set an appointment or unless they agreed to in advance? I can give you an example. Several years ago we've had a Feast site at Lake Junaluska in North Carolina. And I think it was the first year we were there. My family rented a house right by the lake. Really cool.

My good friend David Cobb was there and staying in an apartment, and we both like to run in the mornings. So he said, Frank, do you want to get together and run every couple of days? Yeah, that's great. So we met outside on the path at like 6 a.m. and we were running around the lake. Now if somebody comes out and says, what's going on there? There's a couple of dudes running on the path. They would think, well, they must have agreed together to meet and do that.

Do you see two people doing something like that if they didn't have a plan to do so? Not usually. Generally it'd be one in front and the other behind him chasing. No, not that. But you see what I mean? And he's saying, if you see two people walking together, they agreed to walk together. He's talking about cause and effect, not necessarily saying they have to agree on all their common principles of life.

Okay, now having said that, like I said, it fits with the theme of cause and effect. You see certain things, you know this caused it, and he's going to lead up to the punishment for sin that God is bringing, and of course the warning through the prophets. Please, please don't take any of what I'm saying now to mean, we'll go marry someone outside the Church. You'll be glad you did. You know, that's not what this means either. I'm just saying we want to understand what God inspired this for in the proper context.

There are plenty of other scriptures we can use to support the idea that we want to marry someone that shares our values, and that God even gives us commands about marrying in the faith. So please, like I said, don't misinterpret what I'm saying, but let's keep this where it belongs.

All right, I think I'm going to stop there. We'll pick up, maybe review some of this, and in our next class we'll continue on our way through Amos. Maybe at a little faster pace than we did through Joel, because there are some things we can skim.

But thanks very much. We'll call it a day for now.