For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Amos 6:1-7

1 Woe to you who are complacent in Zion,
    and to you who feel secure on Mount Samaria,
you notable men of the foremost nation,
    to whom the people of Israel come!
2 Go to Kalneh and look at it;
    go from there to great Hamath,
    and then go down to Gath in Philistia.
Are they better off than your two kingdoms?
    Is their land larger than yours?
3 You put off the day of disaster
    and bring near a reign of terror.
4 You lie on beds adorned with ivory
    and lounge on your couches.
You dine on choice lambs
    and fattened calves.
5 You strum away on your harps like David
    and improvise on musical instruments.
6 You drink wine by the bowlful
    and use the finest lotions,
    but you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph.
7 Therefore you will be among the first to go into exile;
    your feasting and lounging will end.

A. Find Out

1. Who does he now speak against? v.1
2. What does he counsel them to do, and ponder? v.2
3. What wrong assessment do they make? v.3
4. How are they filling their lives? v.4-6a
5. But what don’t they do? v.6b
6. Therefore what will happen? v.7

B. Think:

1. What is the lifestyle of those he now speaks against?
2. How does he sum up their outlook?
3. But what will happen?

C. Comment:

Amos sometimes tends to focus on specific groups of people. In chapter 4 it had been the affluent women. Now he simply addresses those men who are living in affluent complacency.

They are men who are well off in both Samaria and Jerusalem (v.1) and because they are well off, they are complacent, self-satisfied, and clearly indifferent to the real state of their nations (v.6c). Amos seeks to shake them out of their complacency.

But first he counsels them to go and check out places like Babylonia, Syria, and Philistia (v.2), for they seem to think they are greater than others, but the truth is that they have a false security (v.3); they are no greater than these others (and in fact it will be these other nations that the Lord will eventually use to discipline them and take them away).

Then he declares what he sees of their lifestyles: they lazily lounge about, focusing on fine food (v.4), they make music (v.5), they drink large amounts (v.6a) and are able to use fine lotions (v.6b), a privilege of the affluent we might note, not for the poor, and they are completely indifferent to the spiritual state of their nations (v.6c).

Then comes the line to shake them up in their complacency: very well, get ready to go into exile, to be taken away from this affluent life-style as an enemy invader (implied) comes, takes over your land and takes you away from all this. (v.7)

D. Application:

1. The Lord calls His people to be self-aware.
2. If that awareness brings concern, do something about it, change!

Amos 6:8-14

8 The Sovereign Lord has sworn by himself—the Lord God Almighty declares:

“I abhor the pride of Jacob
    and detest his fortresses;
I will deliver up the city
    and everything in it.”

9 If ten people are left in one house, they too will die. 10 And if the relative who comes to carry the bodies out of the house to burn them asks anyone who might be hiding there, “Is anyone else with you?” and he says, “No,” then he will go on to say, “Hush! We must not mention the name of the Lord.”

11 For the Lord has given the command,
    and he will smash the great house into pieces
    and the small house into bits.

12 Do horses run on the rocky crags?
    Does one plow the sea with oxen?
But you have turned justice into poison
    and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness—
13 you who rejoice in the conquest of Lo Debar
    and say, “Did we not take Karnaim by our own strength?”

14 For the Lord God Almighty declares,
    “I will stir up a nation against you, Israel,
that will oppress you all the way
    from Lebo Hamath to the valley of the Arabah.”

A. Find Out

1. What has the Lord done, feels, and will do? v.8
2. What does he say about large households? v.9,10
3. What has the Lord determined to do? v,11
4. Why, what have they done? v.12
5. Of what had they boasted? v.13
6. But what will the Lord now do? v.14

B. Think:

1. How does the focus largely change from the people to the Lord?
2. How does He detail what He’s going to do?
3. What won’t stop Him?

C. Comment:

Having, in the first half of the chapter, well and truly focused on the actions of the notable men of the two main communities of the northern and southern kingdoms of Israel and Judah, Amos now reveals the Lord’s intent.

The Lord has sworn to Himself (v.8) – that is the strength of His feelings and intentions – that He will act against the pride of these people, and completely give them over to an enemy (implied).

It doesn’t matter how fine their house, how big their households, they will be destroyed and no one will be left to utter the name of the Lord. (v.9,10). The security they have in affluence is false, for the Lord has decreed that all these big and fine houses will be destroyed (v.11).

There are right ways that the world works (v.12a) but these men have abandoned them so that justice and righteousness have been polluted and are now absent in the way they should exist in the nations (v.12b).

They may look to petty triumphs and victories that they have had in the past (v.13) but these will mean nothing when the Lord stirs up another more powerful nation to come against them that will sweep through the entire land (v.14).

The chapter is comprehensive in, first of all, it’s denunciation of the affluent men (probably leaders) of both Samaria and Jerusalem, and then the Lord’s intents in respect of both – judgment, destruction, and exile.

D. Application:

1. God holds nations and individuals accountable for their sin.
2. His activity will come, even if it appears delayed.