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 5:1-6

1 Hear this word, Israel, this lament I take up concerning you:

2 “Fallen is Virgin Israel,
    never to rise again,
deserted in her own land,
    with no one to lift her up.”

3 This is what the Sovereign Lord says to Israel:

“Your city that marches out a thousand strong
    will have only a hundred left;
your town that marches out a hundred strong
    will have only ten left.”

4 This is what the Lord says to Israel:

“Seek me and live;
5     do not seek Bethel,
do not go to Gilgal,
    do not journey to Beersheba.
For Gilgal will surely go into exile,
    and Bethel will be reduced to nothing.”
6 Seek the Lord and live,
    or he will sweep through the tribes of Joseph like a fire;
it will devour them,
    and Bethel will have no one to quench it.

A. Find Out

1. To whom and how does this next word appear? v.1
2. How does the prophet now see Israel? v.2
3. What is going to apparently happen? v.3
4. So what does the Lord call them to do? v.4
5. What are they not to do and why? v.5
6. And if they don’t? v.6

B. Think:

1. What emotion do you think this word is supposed to evoke?
2. In what two ways does it come as a warning?
3. What hope is conveyed?

C. Comment:

This first part of the chapter comes to Israel but it is described as a ‘lament’ (v.1) which is usually an expression of a deep feeling of anguish. It is clearly what the prophet is feeling.

The prophet sees Israel as having fallen with no one to help her. (v.2) She is alone after having been brought down. Cities and towns that were numbered in thousands and hundreds will be reduced to a hundred or ten (v.3) i.e. there is going to be a massive depopulating of the land – presumably either being killed or taken into exile by an enemy.   The call from the Lord is brief and to the point: “seek me and live”, (v.4) i.e. come back to me, restore our relationship.

But then comes a secondary warning – don’t go scuttling off to other places (v.5) for each of such places as you might choose in your land will suffer the same. There will be no escape.

And so that call of v.4 is repeated, “seek the Lord and live,” but now to that is added a further warning (v.6): if you don’t do that, this judgment will come and clear the land and the places that were once known for their proper worship (which you have desecrated with your idol worship – implied) will no longer be places of security before the Lord, for they too will be utterly swept away. This lament reveals that judgment IS coming and there are no places to escape to.

D. Application:

1. Observe the clarity of God’s warnings to Israel before they happen.
2. This is not so much about their sin as about their survival.

Amos 5:7-13

7 There are those who turn justice into bitterness
    and cast righteousness to the ground.

8 He who made the Pleiades and Orion,
    who turns midnight into dawn
    and darkens day into night,
who calls for the waters of the sea
    and pours them out over the face of the land—
    the Lord is his name.
9 With a blinding flash he destroys the stronghold
    and brings the fortified city to ruin.

10 There are those who hate the one who upholds justice in court
    and detest the one who tells the truth.

11 You levy a straw tax on the poor
    and impose a tax on their grain.
Therefore, though you have built stone mansions,
    you will not live in them;
though you have planted lush vineyards,
    you will not drink their wine.
12 For I know how many are your offenses
    and how great your sins.

There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes
    and deprive the poor of justice in the courts.
13 Therefore the prudent keep quiet in such times,
    for the times are evil.

A. Find Out

1. Who are next spoken against? v.7
2. How is God next referred to? v.8
3. Of what is He capable? v.9
4. Who are now spoken against v.10
5. Who are the third group spoken against & why? v.11,12a
6. Who are the fourth group identified? v.12b
7. What do they cause good people to do? v.13

B. Think:

1. What is the general sin, detailed in four different ways?
2. How does God warn them in respect of Himself?
3. What therefore upsets the Lord?

C. Comment:

From the general lament of the first six verses, the prophet focuses on what collectively might be called those who abuse justice and reject righteousness (v.7) and make bitter those who suffer from it (v.7a). These people think they are impervious to correction, impregnable and this can ignore warnings (implied), but they should remember that God is the all-powerful Creator (v.8) and His power is such that pulling down and destroying strongholds and fortified cities is no problem. (v.9)

These people not only deny justice to others but they are against those who seek to uphold justice and those who uphold truth (v.10).                

The word continues against those in power (presumably rulers) who unfairly tax the poor while all the while living in their big houses and living lives of luxury (v.11a) but all this will be taken from them (v.11b). They think they get away with it but the Lord sees everything they do (v.12a) and the extent of their sins. He expands or clarifies it even more, by speaking to those who oppress those who are innocent of such things, they take bribes and they prevent justice being applied in the courts (v.12b). Such is their evil that good people stay quiet and out of the way, no doubt fearful that they might become targets of these people. (v.13) This is all an indictment of a social malaise that had become common among them and the Lord will not tolerate it any more.

D. Application:

1. Godlessness is so often followed by unrighteousness.
2. Unrighteousness is so often associated with injustice.

Amos 5:14-20

14 Seek good, not evil,
    that you may live.
Then the Lord God Almighty will be with you,
    just as you say he is.
15 Hate evil, love good;
    maintain justice in the courts.
Perhaps the Lord God Almighty will have mercy
    on the remnant of Joseph.

16 Therefore this is what the Lord, the Lord God Almighty, says:

“There will be wailing in all the streets
    and cries of anguish in every public square.
The farmers will be summoned to weep
    and the mourners to wail.
17 There will be wailing in all the vineyards,
    for I will pass through your midst,”
says the Lord.

18 Woe to you who long
    for the day of the Lord!
Why do you long for the day of the Lord?
    That day will be darkness, not light.
19 It will be as though a man fled from a lion
    only to meet a bear,
as though he entered his house
    and rested his hand on the wall
    only to have a snake bite him.
20 Will not the day of the Lord be darkness, not light—
    pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?

A. Find Out

1. How are good and evil highlighted? v.14a,15a
2. What will attention to these possibly achieve? 14b,15b
3. What is going to be heard throughout the land? v.16,17
4. What may they be tempted to long for? v.18
5. Why will that be hopeless? v.19
6. What indeed will it be? v.20

B. Think:

1. How are heart goals first emphasized?
2. When judgment comes, what might they do?
3. Why will that be pointless?

C. Comment:

If some parts of Amos bring scary news, this is even worse. But first comes the general call to Israel to seek good, love good and avoid evil, even hate it (v.14a,1a5). If you do that there is a hope that God will be for you, maybe even have mercy on you. (v.14b,15b)

But then the Lord comes back to the main warning: judgment IS coming so there will be wailing in the cities and in the countryside and vineyards (v.16,17). But now comes the terrible part.

Even you who say – or will come to say – you long for the day of the Lord, for (implied) you don’t realize what that means (implied v.18). In reality, if you are wanting to flee the judgment as it comes, and you then cry out for the Lord, it will be like you are trying to escape one wild animal only to be faced by an even worse one (v.19). In other words if you try to escape one punishment, wherever you go you’ll find an even worse one.

If you call on the Lord in what you think is a time of light (that perhaps seems to be getting darker), it will only get darker for such are days of judgment  (v.20).

This word is scary because it says to Israel (having ignored all the calls to repentance, having persisted in your sins and having refused to heed the Lord’s various warnings) the judgment He is warning you about WILL come and there is NO hope of avoiding it.

D. Application:

1. We may use words but hope only comes with a change of heart.
2. Remember the judgement actually fell on Samaria in 722BC.

Amos 5:21-27

21 “I hate, I despise your religious festivals;
    your assemblies are a stench to me.
22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings,
    I will not accept them.
Though you bring choice fellowship offerings,
    I will have no regard for them.
23 Away with the noise of your songs!
    I will not listen to the music of your harps.
24 But let justice roll on like a river,
    righteousness like a never-failing stream!

25 “Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings
    forty years in the wilderness, people of Israel?
26 You have lifted up the shrine of your king,
    the pedestal of your idols,
    the star of your god—
    which you made for yourselves.
27 Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Damascus,”
    says the Lord, whose name is God Almighty.

A. Find Out

1. What did God despise? v.21
2. Why was bringing offerings hopeless? v.22
3. What did He say He would not listen to? v.23
4. What did He say He wanted? v.24
5. To what part of history did He remind them? v.25
6. What have they done? v.26
7. So what is He going to do? v,27

B. Think:

1. Why is religion pointless in the face of a sin-crisis?
2. What is the only thing that will stave off the crisis?
3. What lessons should we glean from all this ?  

C. Comment:

No one can ever say the Lord never warned them. Israel have heard all the words from the Lord through Amos, but he keeps on. They have carried on their ‘religion’ and religious festivals, but the Lord hates them (v.21).  Indeed they can bring as many offerings as they like – burnt, fellowship or choice offerings – but they are all meaningless (v. 22), and as for all your singing, forget it! (v.23)

The Lord had pointed out their failure to maintain justice and so if they want to put things right, let it return to the land (v.24).

Stop and think about it, is what He is basically saying, in the forty years in the wilderness did you bring offerings in the desert while you waited to die? (v.25) It was pointless then, and it’s pointless now!

Face it. You have elevated your little gods and idols (v.26) and that’s where you still are (implied). So, the conclusion is that you will go into exile way up north (v.27).

And that of course is exactly what happened in 722BC (see 2 Kings 17:7,23) The destruction of Samaria and the deportation of all the people of the northern kingdom is clearly documented in the Old Testament records, and in the studies we have seen so far in Amos, the warnings have been explicit and the possibilities of avoiding such a thing have been laid out, yet Israel continued to ignore them.  

D. Application:

1. Sin blinds to the truth, even when God speaks.
2. God is not deterred.  He will act as He has said.