0 Amos Introduction

Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down. 9:2

Trivia: In Amos 9, what did God say would happen to people who fled from him to the bottom of the sea?

I have sent among you the pestilence ... your young men have I slain with the sword ... I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils, yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the LORD. -- Amos 4:10

Amos for Skeptics

Highlights

  • The divine pyromaniac threatens to "send fire unto" Hazel, Gaza, Tyrus, Teman, Rabbah, Moab, and Judah. 1:4 - 2:5
  • "A man and his father will go in unto the same maid, to profane my holy name." 2:7
  • All evil comes from God. 3:6
  • God afflicted the Israelites with "cleanness of teeth" (famine), drought, blasting, and mildew. He killed them with pestilence, slaughtered them with the sword, and "made the stink of their camps come up into their noses." And yet they still didn't return to him. What is wrong with people? 4:6-10
  • Woe is everyone (especially musicians and wine drinkers). 6:1-6
  • God burned up the earth and sea, and then he repented for it. 7:4-6
  • He stands on a wall holding a plumb line while he talks to Amos. 7:7
  • "Thus saith the LORD; Thy wife shall be an harlot in the city, and thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword ... and thou shalt die in a polluted land." 7:17
  • God shows Amos a basket of summer fruit and tells him that the end has come. 8:1-2
  • "There shall be many dead bodies in every place." 8:3
  • "I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day." 8:9
  • "I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness upon every head." 8:10
  • Amos sees God standing on the altar. 9:1
  • God will kill "the last of them with the sword," and any that try to escape by diving to the bottom of the sea will be bitten, at God's command, by a serpent. God will set his "eyes upon them for evil, not for good." 9:1-4

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