Amos: A Faithful Farmer (Summary)

From our Sunday service on October 29, 2023, a message from the book of Amos. Watch the full message: Amos: A Faithful Farmer on YouTube.

In Israel, the worship of Baal and other Canaanite gods had become increasingly integrated with the worship of Yahweh. That is called syncretism, the combining of religious practices from one religion into another. God called Amos to deliver a message of judgment, primarily to Israel but also to the surrounding nations. Amos was giving this declaration around 760 to 755 BC. He lived in Tekoa, in Judah, near a place we might know, Bethlehem, a very rural farming and shepherding area not far from Jerusalem. The name Amos is unique in the Bible. No other character is ever called Amos. It means “the carrier of a burden,” and it’s possible he was given this name because it was his responsibility to carry the burden of Israel, the burden for the people who had fallen away from God.

Who Was Amos?

Verse 1 says he was a herdsman. We would usually call such a person a shepherd, but the word shepherd in Israel carried the connotation of a pastor, someone who takes you to pasture, a preacher or spiritual leader. Amos goes out of his way not to call himself a shepherd. Literally in the Hebrew he calls himself a cattle herder. The Israelite religion was at one of its peaks, and they had a whole school of prophets trained in the art of prophecy. Amos wasn’t from that school. He was no student of Isaiah. He was a simple fig tree farmer, harvesting sycamore figs seasonally in the rural countryside. Amos is a guy like us, a faithful farmer, someone God saw doing his daily job. God said, “This man loves me, and I can use him to send my message to the people around him.” Amos went from the orchard to being an oracle of God’s words, not because of who he was but because of what God had for him.

Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycomore fruit: And the LORD took me as I followed the flock, and the LORD said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel.

Amos 7:14–15

A Spiral Toward Israel

The book opens with a unique structure of judgments. Each judgment follows a spiral pattern, and in the middle of the spiral is Israel itself. God condemns Damascus, then Gaza, then Tyre, then Ammon, then Moab, then Edom, step by step getting closer to His people. Eventually the judgment gets to Judah, and it starts to get a little uncomfortable. All of this was to show that the judgment on the other nations was the judgment Israel would face too, because Israel had lost its representative role in spirit, not in position. Judah despised the law of the Lord, hadn’t kept His commandments, and their lies caused them to err, following the lie that it is better to be in bondage to sin and better to have your own way. There are two ways you will face the fire of God. Either you face it in hell as eternal punishment, or you face the fire of purification as a believer, since the Bible says believers are tried by fire.

Three Sins of Israel

Israel’s sins were worse still. There is a sexual sin: “a man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name.” This is part of Jeroboam II’s new cult of Yahweh, with false temples in Bethel and Gilgal and temple prostitutes performing these sinful acts in the name of Yahweh. They also reclined by every altar on clothing they had taken as collateral. They loaned money to the poor, took the clothes off their backs, and knelt on them when they went to worship. God says that is disgusting to me. They also drank “the wine of the condemned in the house of their God.” It would be like us having communion today with juice taken as a penalty fee for unpaid loans. These poor people couldn’t farm and couldn’t pay, and the lenders celebrated worship with wine taken from people with no food on their table. God saved the Israelites from exploitation in Egypt. “You were the oppressed one before. How dare you take this gift of freedom and use it to oppress your brother?” The spiritual leaders told the Nazarites it was okay to drink wine, and they told the prophets, “Do not prophesy to us.”

Hear this word that the LORD hath spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying, You only have I known of all the families of the earth: therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities.

Amos 3:1–2

"Punish" Means "Visit"

We have a unique relationship with God, but it’s only through the blood of Jesus Christ. The only difference between the saved and the unsaved is the acceptance of the work of Jesus Christ. It’s very interesting what the Hebrew word behind “punish” is. When Joseph died, he told his children that God would surely visit them. That word “visit” is the same Hebrew word used here for “punish.” It carries the idea of caring for, nourishing, or providing for. It only comes to mean “punish” from its context. You could literally translate it, “I will take care of you for all your iniquities.” When the Israelites were in bondage, God took care of them by freeing them. When they were the oppressors, God takes care of them by correcting them. If you’re living in God’s will, the way He cares for you is by giving you joy, blessing, hope, and peace. If you’re living outside His will, the way He cares for you is to correct you. As believers we have the gift of correction. That is a gift, not spite.

Seek Me and Live

Can two walk together, except they be agreed? Will a lion roar in the forest, when he hath no prey? This is a list of things that are obviously “no” answers. In the same way, God is not going to judge you unless the prophets have come and warned you. There is no judgment where the truth has not been taught. That lion waiting to say “the food’s here” is roaring right now, and God is raising Amos as a prophet to speak about this injustice. Bethel and Gilgal were temples to Yahweh that were not the temple in Jerusalem. The altar had horns that symbolized power, and God says, “I’m going to go to your temples in Bethel and cut off the symbol that they have any power.” “Seek me and you will live. But don’t come to me in Bethel. Don’t come with your hypocrisy and your easy believer lifestyle.” “Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion.” These people were worshiping gods dedicated to the constellations. Don’t look at the stars. Look at the creator of them. Amos first felt his call when he saw the locusts go through the land and said, “This must be the judgment of God.”

Noise in God's Ears

The Israelites never stopped offering their sacrifices, but they weren’t living in God’s commandments or God’s will. So God says, “Take away from me the noise of your songs.” That is a very intentional choice of word. False worship is not just emptiness to God. Meaningless worship isn’t just empty, it is actively antagonistic, a noise in His ears. God would rather you be apathetic than falsely worship. Paul tells us not to give an offering to God if we’re doing it begrudgingly because we feel obligated. If you’re walking through the steps of being a believer out of obligation, just stop. It would be better to be honest than to come to Him and think you can pull the wool over the eyes of God and pretend that you love Him. “Let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.” That is a continuously flowing fountain, like a freshwater spring in Israel. A lot of rivers there didn’t run all year. God says, “I don’t want you to be a seasonal stream of righteousness. I don’t want you to be righteous only when it’s comfortable. I want you to be a year-long river like the Jordan.”

Behold, the days come, saith the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD: And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the LORD, and shall not find it.

Amos 8:11–12

A Faithful Farmer in an Age of Compromise

What does that look like today? Homosexuality and transgenderism have made their way into our churches. First they made it into the culture around us, like the Canaanites had their idolatry, and we said, “Maybe we won’t go out of our way to denounce it.” I’m not saying we go to people and condemn them as harsh and evil and wicked. But we acknowledge it, and we say, “Personally I believe it’s wrong, I will not choose to walk that way, and I can’t make you change, but I pray that God would show you His grace and mercy and that His grace and mercy would cause you to change and live righteously.” Another example is the prosperity gospel, preaching that if you give all your money to the church, God will bless you with so much more. Amos wasn’t living the dream. He was a faithful farmer who seasonally farmed some figs just to get a little extra money. There is a false prophet in this book named Amaziah who tells Amos, “This message is too harsh. They’re not ready for this truth yet. Do not prophesy about it.” Why do we worship God? Is it to be blessed by Him, or is it to appreciate Him for who He truly is? Calling yourself a Christian is not the same as being a follower of Christ. Will you be like Amos and stand for the truth when the religious leaders turn from God’s way, when the Christian is told to take in the poison of false doctrine, and when the preacher is told to keep silence?