"Amos" continues with another doom-promising prophet of God, but it does it in its own way and has a particular part that I found amusing. I have no choice to to keep this brief since the book is rather light on content.
The thing that I enjoyed the most about "Amos" was the listing out of "charges" against the different cities of Israel. He lists out the number of charges and then further explains them in brief. He then casts sentence upon them which is often described as some sort of burning with fire. It was very orderly like that you might hear in a court of law.
The charges cover the first few books. The last half of the book is merely an essay on the fact that those same sentenced people, if still alive after the sentence is passed, should seek to do good and shun evil in order to be saved. Although this may seem obvious, you have to understand the people God was dealing with. They were not very smart.
Amos himself was persecuted for what he was saying, similarly to Jeremiah. They pretty much asked him what the heck he was doing, yelling all these charges at them. As usual, nobody liked the prophets of God because they never said anything very friendly or nice.
The only other thing I'd like to mention is that there was an interesting passage about the day of the Lord being "darkness and not light. Even very dark, and no brightness in it." It is referring to the fact that when God has his dues against sinners, he entirely abandons them and lets them fall miserably, but it also reminds me that light came from God to begin with. Without God there would be darkness which is His natural state. Before the beginning, God existed in a void of darkness. This passage reminded me of that, and I thought it was cool.
I totally recommend "Amos." It reads well, and is one of the easier to understand prophets. It is totally worth it to see the charges leveled against all the stupid people. They entirely had it coming.
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VERY interesting about the day of the Lord being one of darkness. Yes, he created light. He gave it to his people... and he can take it away. Unlike them, he can thrive in darkness. He proved this by creating light from WITHIN the darkness. The created pride themselves in what they cannot take credit for. Sometimes God reminds WHO the blessings came from... by taking them away.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I liked that part. I made a lot of assumptions, but I really enjoy getting some confirmation once in a while.
DeleteSad that these prophets had to list all the grievances against the people of Israel, I mean they never seem self-aware until they incur God's wrath. The poor prophets have to suffer worldly punishment because of the people's stupidity. Interesting about the Day of the Lord, indeed God is the source of all including light so it will be the people's fault when they are left in the dark.
ReplyDeleteHow could he create light when it already existed?
DeleteThose who tell people what they would rather not hear are often persecuted. They are much more comfortable with the ones who would deceive them. The truth may hurt for awhile, but the consequences of lies can last much longer.
ReplyDeleteEveryone just wants to be told happy things so they don't have to deal with reality.
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