Avoidable disaster
Amos 7:1-6; 1/1/2023; BCBC/IOUC; Rev. Paul Wang
Introduction
Looking at history, what God actually wants from man is an attitude, an attitude of confessing and repenting! It’s just that people’s ignorance and pride hinder the development of the relationship between God and man, so that the ultimate wage is death. Let’s look at the first point:
God made locusts
How embarrassing that the locusts were created by the Lord! It may not be easy for us to understand, is it? First, the locusts are after cutting vegetables. Obviously, the government collecting taxes from the people is like cutting leeks, which has been a habit since ancient times. It is also normal to collect taxes and maintain the operation of the regime. It’s just that when the king of Israel did not act righteously, oppressed the people, and extorted money, he provoked God’s wrath. After three years of Zero-COVID, Artemisia cleared the leeks and scraped the vegetable garden, and the next plague of locusts is coming soon. In the Book of Exodus, the plague of locusts is the eighth plague, and immediately after the plague of darkness is the plague of killing the firstborn. That was the catastrophe of a nation! The white guard persecuted a family in Shanghai, threatening their three generations. The youth of this family said: I am the last generation, and there will be no more three generations to keep picking wool and cutting leeks for you.
Second, the locusts had stripped the land clean. Mencius said: “tyranny is fiercer than a tiger”, which means that the tyranny of those in power is more ferocious than a tiger. Since those in power in Israel do not cherish the people’s livelihood so much, they keep cutting leeks over and over again. Well, God will simply let your wickedness go. The mentality of those in power is vicious and greedy, and they will not be satisfied no matter how much they cut off. Because the characteristic of leeks is that they will grow again after being cut, and they will continue to grow in cycles. What is this? Is it the wise leadership of the ruler? Of course not! This is the grace bestowed by God! As long as those in power do not interfere with the lives of the people, the people have the grace from God. The essence of the so-called reform and opening up is to let go and return power to the people. Because the human heart is more deceitful than all things, and the human heart is greedy to the extreme and cannot extricate itself, far better than locusts are willing to eat the green things on the ground.
Finally, it is a revelation that the Lord created the locusts. God told the Israelites through the prophet Amos, if you still don’t understand, then I will create locusts to let you see clearly. For those in power, it is a mirror, which is the truth that tyranny is fiercer than a tiger. That is to say, your exploitation and profiteering of the common people is unacceptable. If you continue to break the covenant and show no mercy to the people, God will create locusts to eat up all the green things in the land. For the people, it is a declaration of God’s great love! How to say it? The prophet Amos said that “the Lord made the locusts”. Since it was created by the Lord, the Lord will rule it! Facing the curse and judgment, David said: I would rather fall into the hands of the living God! For his wrath is short-lived, but his love endures forever. Let’s look at the second point:
Ask for God’s forgiveness
We may easily overlook a very important thing, which is to ask the Lord for forgiveness. If we do not, or neglect to ask the Lord for forgiveness, we will not be able to get through a day or stand for a moment! First, pray to God. Don’t say you saw it, but you heard the news that God created locusts, so you should pray to God, do you agree? The question is how to pray? What do you say when you pray? In fact, it’s the wrestling before prayer that counts, right? We might think, Lord! How could you make locusts? Don’t you know that locusts eat crops? If the crops are eaten by locusts, people will starve to death, don’t you know? When the entanglements are over, how should we pray? Say: Lord, I want to thank You! Thanks for what? Thank Him for making locusts? Why? Why not? Have you found that there are actually two different values talking or exchanging here. It seems that the voice of man is louder, saying: God can only create good things, not bad things. For example, how could God create Satan? However, the Bible says that God is a God who works miracles alone, and does not need people to advise Him and tell Him how to create the heavens and the earth. The essence of the relationship between man and God is to pray to God! In Christ, knock and the door will be opened, pray and it will be answered!
Second, Jacob is small. It is universal wisdom that people can live out their smallness before God. Amos said “Jacob is small”, which shows that Amos has historical perspective and realistic prayer. The first generation of Jacob, who was later renamed Israel by God, wrestled with God and finally found himself small. He has been grasping for a lifetime, and finally understands that the ultimate goal of life is to grasp God. This time, he caught it. Amos continued Jacob’s prayer, and also grasped God’s mercy for Israel! There is no shame in showing weakness before God, and it is pleasing to the Lord to be like a child. This is also the way of getting along between people and between countries. Taking humility as the way of fellowship is far better than the prostration of the wolf warrior.
Lastly, not able to survive. The prophet Amos expressed the extreme humility of the Israelites by saying that he could not survive, which is very wise. What he meant was, Lord, look, your son, your chosen people Israel, cannot do without you! No, you have seen it too, once you leave, you can’t even survive! If you do not forgive the sin of Jacob, how will Israel, your chosen people, live? Have mercy on them! Next to them are Assyria, Egypt, Syria, Philistia, Edom, Ammon, Moab, etc., all waiting to laugh at them! How can you seek among the dead to worship you? Lord, I, Jacob, am Yours! the sheep of your pasture, You are my Shepherd! Let’s look at the third point:
The disaster will not happen
In fact, God’s heart is very soft. As long as people sincerely repent to Him, He will give them a chance. First, the Lord relented. Jeremiah and the prophet Amos have one thing in common, which is their mood. The prophet Amos saw that the northern kingdom of Israel would be destroyed forty years later, and Jeremiah saw the situation of the southern kingdom of Judah forty years later. Can be sympathetic to each other. Jeremiah said to God’s elect: “He said, “Can I not do with you, Israel, as this potter does?” declares the Lord. “Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, Israel. (Jeremiah 18:6)” The next sentence is earth-shattering: “and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned.
(Jeremiah 18:8)” Jeremiah may have read the book of Amos to understand God’s “relent complex.”
Second, God is still righteous. Of course, Amos still had to return to reality to intercede for Israel. Because of His righteousness, God instructed the prophet Amos one thing, that He would send fire to punish Israel. Like the locusts, the fire was also made by the LORD. He promised Noah that he would no longer destroy mankind with water, but he did not say that he would not punish Israel with fire. He said: The fire dried up the great deep and devoured the land. The great deep can refer to the fire of hell, pointing directly to the final judgment. It can also be the flame of “retribution for the present world”, which will burn all idols and demonstrate God’s righteousness. Locusts have eyes, and plagues have mouths, and they come to eat Pharaoh’s crops and Bethlehem’s wheat. With the aid of nucleic acid testing, the scene of the troubled times of turning positive on and off was finally revealed! Do you think God’s righteous eyes cannot see you? Can the holy arm of God not reach you?
Finally, God spared again. The prophet prayed for the people, prayed for God’s mercy, and said: Lord, your people Jacob is small and helpless, and cannot survive without you. If you don’t forgive Israel, how can Jacob survive? In just six verses, the Lord forgave Israel twice, saying: This disaster will not happen! He also said: This disaster will not happen either! As the sermon is written here, my eyelids are wet, and I shed tears of gratitude! Oh God! Aren’t we like this, forgiven again and again, healed again and again, protected and cared for by You again and again? This is unworthiness in our lives, unworthy of the grace God has given you!
Conclusion
Well, thank the Lord! Today’s world has entered an era of constant disasters, and the illusion of tranquility has disappeared. May God help us to grasp the Lord’s grace to forgive our sins again, rely on the Lord to pass through the avoidable disasters, and enter the promised land given by God.
Let us pray……
Amos 7:1-6
1 This is what the Sovereign Lord showed me: He was preparing swarms of locusts after the king’s share had been harvested and just as the late crops were coming up.
2 When they had stripped the land clean, I cried out, “Sovereign Lord, forgive! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!”
3 So the Lord relented. “This will not happen,” the Lord said.
4 This is what the Sovereign Lord showed me: The Sovereign Lord was calling for judgment by fire; it dried up the great deep and devoured the land.
5 Then I cried out, “Sovereign Lord, I beg you, stop! How can Jacob survive? He is so small!”
6 So the Lord relented. “This will not happen either,” the Sovereign Lord said.