Amos 8:1-3 (NASB)
This is what the Lord God showed me, and behold, there was a basket of summer fruit. 2 And He said, “What do you see, Amos?” And I said, “A basket of summer fruit.”
Then the Lord said to me, “The end has come for My people Israel. I will not spare them any longer. 3 The songs of the palace will turn to wailing on that day,” declares the Lord God. “The corpses will be many; in every place they will throw them out. Hush!”
In reading through the Bible, the other night I read this passage in Amos. I noticed this chapter echoes the previous chapter’s format, which says, “7 So He showed me, and behold, the Lord was standing by a vertical wall with a plumb line in His hand. 8 And the Lord said to me, “What do you see, Amos?” And I said, “A plumb line.”
Then the Lord said, “Behold I am about to put a plumb line in the midst of My people Israel. I will not spare them any longer. 9 The high places of Isaac will become deserted, and the sanctuaries of Israel will be in ruins. Then I will rise up against the house of Jeroboam with the sword” (Amos 7:7-9).
This time, in Chapter 8, instead of a plumb line, the Lord showed the prophet Amos a basket of summer fruit. A basket of summer fruit seems like an odd thing for the Lord to show to a prophet, but like the plumb line, there is great significance in the Lord’s object lesson.
In the NIV translation, the passage is translated a little differently. It says:
This is what the Sovereign Lord showed me: a basket of ripe fruit. 2 “What do you see, Amos?” he asked. “A basket of ripe fruit,” I answered.
Then the Lord said to me, “The time is ripe for my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.”
3 “In that day,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “the songs in the temple will turn to wailing. Many, many bodies—flung everywhere! Silence!”
A basket of ripe fruit helps us understand better what the Lord is saying, doesn’t it? Summer is the harvest time for fruit, and so the words, “summer fruit” mean that the fruit is ripe. It is time for harvest. The NIV says, “The time is ripe for my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.” The NASB says, “The end has come for My people Israel. I will not spare them any longer.”
It’s summer right now. Literally, the official start of summer was a few days ago. If I lived somewhere I could garden, I am sure I would be harvesting produce by now. I have been buying lots of fruit, though. Sometimes we don’t eat all of it before it is too ripe. I like the NASB translation that says that the end has come. I think the end has come for the bananas sitting on our counter right now. Either someone needs to eat them, or they won’t make it. We can’t keep them any longer. They are about to expire past their due date. It’s now or never for those bananas.
This is what the Lord is telling Amos as He shows him this basket of summer fruit. The fruit is ripe. It’s about to expire. The end has come for the fruit. It’s now or never. God will not spare the fruit any longer. He’s not going to keep it any longer. Then God makes crystal clear what the ripe fruit represents. He says, “The end has come for My people Israel.” Israel is the fruit in this metaphor.
The second part of this phrase, “The end has come for My people Israel. I will not spare them any longer” also echoes the plumb line sentence. He says then, too, “I will not spare them any longer.” God is telling Amos that the time is up for Israel. Like He explained in the chapter about the plumb line, He is going to be holding up a standard against their sin. He’s been patient in the past and overlooked their sin, but now the time has come. He’s not going to let things slide any longer. He is continuing this same message, but this time, using fruit as the illustration. Just like He warned about the plumb line, He says again that judgement is coming and it won’t be good. Verse 3 warns, “In that day,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “the songs in the temple will turn to wailing. Many, many bodies—flung everywhere! Silence!”
That last word, silence or hush, depending on the translation, is interesting, isn’t it? Is God directing that at Amos to be quiet? I looked this verse up in a Hebrew parallel on Biblehub.com and the translation reads, “they shall be thrown out in silence.” That’s very different, but it seems more accurate. I don’t know when or why the translation changed so much. I guess that’s a good example of why it’s important to read multiple translations when studying Scripture.
The rest of this chapter says: 4 Hear this, you who trample the needy and do away with the poor of the land,
5 saying, “When will the New Moon be over that we may sell grain, and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat?”— skimping on the measure, boosting the price and cheating with dishonest scales, 6 buying the poor with silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling even the sweepings with the wheat.
7 The Lord has sworn by himself, the Pride of Jacob: “I will never forget anything they have done.
8 “Will not the land tremble for this, and all who live in it mourn? The whole land will rise like the Nile; it will be stirred up and then sink like the river of Egypt.
9 “In that day,” declares the Sovereign Lord,
“I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight. 10 I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day.
11 “The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign Lord, “when I will send a famine through the land— not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. 12 People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.
13 “In that day the lovely young women and strong young men will faint because of thirst. 14 Those who swear by the sin of Samaria— who say, ‘As surely as your god lives, Dan,’ or, ‘As surely as the god of Beersheba lives’— they will fall, never to rise again.”
This whole chapter is a prophecy of the judgment that is coming upon the people because they have not followed God’s ways. He listed some of the many ways the people were dishonoring God and disobeying Him. He says that they can’t wait for the Sabbath to be over so they can go back to making money. The Sabbath is just a burden to them that keeps them from cheating people. They are taking advantage of the poor, and the Lord is angry about it. He sees what they are doing, and He’s warning them that judgment is coming. There is going to be darkness coming. Instead of joyful songs, the people’s tune will turn to mourning. There will be a famine of the word of God.
This idea of a famine, not of food or water, but of the word of God, makes me think of today in America. We have more access to Scripture today than at any other time in history, yet it seems like we rarely hear the Word of God. It wasn’t always like this. I remember in 2003, on a trip to the Grand Canyon, that there were beautiful placards overlooking the gorge. These placards had scripture verses on them declaring the majesty of the Lord. No kidding, the next month after our trip, the news reported that those verses were being removed because the ACLU complained that the placards violated the U.S. Constitution (https://www.religionnewsblog.com/3738/biblical-verses-removed-from-grand-canyon). I remember being shocked and saddened that they were removing not just a really cool piece of historic literature, but that they were silencing, again, the word of the Lord. Our country has systematically removed scripture from so many places. Even more troubling to me, our churches seem to keep removing scripture, too. Some churches, in their efforts to win people to Christ, use very little scripture in their sermons. They instead choose to talk about self-help topics. They will have 1 verse that they start their topic off with, and then quickly move on from it to clips from movies or quotes from popular culture. When even our churches have reduced the word of the Lord, we are clearly in a famine. The effects from it are unquantifiable. People are starving for truth. Like the Lord says, “People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.”
In our modern age of unlimited information, people are staggering from internet post to internet post, looking for truth, but they do not find it. Those of us who know the word of the Lord, we must be bold to proclaim it, so people can hear it. As Romans 10:13-15 says: for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”
If we who know the word of the Lord keep silent, then people will continue in this famine. If unbelievers could simply hear the word of the Lord, they could have the opportunity to believe! One of my favorite verses about Scripture is from Isaiah 55:11, “… my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty.” When we hear the word of the Lord, the Holy Spirit uses it to spark faith inside of us. But if there is no Scripture to be heard, how can they believe?
Instead of a people full of faith and obedience to God, we are left with the same situation we find Israel in at the time of Amos. The people are not following God. They despise the sabbath day of worship. They are immoral. They are too busy to bother with God. Their days of singing are coming to an end, though. We see this same warning again, but in the New Testament.
1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 says:
Now, brothers and sisters, about times and dates we do not need to write to you,2 for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.3 While people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. 4 But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief. 5 You are all children of the light and children of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. 6 So then, let us not be like others, who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. 7 For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. 8 But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. 9 For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.10 He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. 11 Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.
I think this is the same warning as Amos gives. The day will come, either collectively because the Lord will return, or individually our days will be over, and the fruit will be ripe. It will be the end. We will all come to our end. And like Israel, most people won’t expect it. It will catch them unaware. The day of judgement will arrive. This letter to the Thessalonians tells us that we believers should not be unprepared. We should be ready and awake. We will not suffer the judgement and wrath, because we have salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He has died for us, and whether the believer has already physically died or is still alive when He returns, we will all live together with him. This reckoning that the Lord is foretelling in both Amos and Thessalonians is not something we who follow Jesus need to fear. This is the Good News! This is the reason why we should care that there is a spiritual famine in our world. We must be the people who tell others that they, too, can come to the Lord and find forgiveness and salvation. People might think none of this is real, but just because they have removed scripture from public places, does not mean they have removed the judgements of God. They might think that life is just a matter of buying and selling, eat and drinking, entertainment alternating with suffering, but life is so much bigger than that. God wants to bring all people from a place of just surviving, to a place of thriving. We describe children who are growing and maturing at a healthy rate as thriving. The rest of chapter 55 of Isaiah is a call from the Lord to His people to come to this thriving life:
1“Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; and you who have no money, come, buy and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. 2 Why spend money on what is not bread, and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and you will delight in the richest of fare. 3 Give ear and come to me; listen, that you may live. I will make an everlasting covenant with you, my faithful love promised to David. 4 See, I have made him a witness to the peoples, a ruler and commander of the peoples. 5 Surely you will summon nations you know not, and nations you do not know will come running to you, because of the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, for he has endowed you with splendor.”
6 Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near. 7 Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. 9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. 10 As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, 11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it. 12 You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. 13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow. This will be for the Lord’s renown, for an everlasting sign, that will endure forever.”
I wanted to include this entire chapter because it so beautifully captures what the alternate to the warning in Amos looks like. Amos is saying that the songs of joy will be over and instead there will be wailing. Here in Isaiah, we see that following the Lord leads us to places of joy. If only the Israelites had not turned away from following the Lord! If only they had continued to keep God’s laws. Instead, they turned away from Him. They broke His commands. They trampled on the poor. They cheated people in their effort to make money. They despised the sabbath. Because of this, He says in Amos 8:10, “I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads.” If they had just followed Him, they could have this abundant, thriving life as described by Isaiah, instead of the looming judgment.
What is profound to me is Amos and Isaiah are contemporaries of each other. They lived at the same time. I don’t know if they knew of one another or which of these prophesies were technically given first. I think it’s important to note that God is speaking both of these messages at around the same moment in history. He is simultaneously calling His people to come back to Him and warning them of His judgement. I think it’s important to read these prophecies at the same time because if we only read Amos, we could walk away from this sermon thinking that God is only full of wrath. By reading them together, we see that He does not delight in judgement. He wants people to come to repentance so He can have mercy on them.
This picture of the love of God calling out to us so we can be forgiven is exactly the same message Jesus brought to us. He is still calling out to people, saying, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” (Matthew 11:28-29). In our world that is starving for the word of God, may we be people who speak the words of hope and life. We must share the truth of the Gospel with a world that is starving for it. The alternative awaiting for them is one of judgement unless they too repent and come to faith. The fruit is ripening. We must tell others before it is too late.
Pray: Thank You, Lord Jesus, for dying on the cross for us so we can be saved. We pray that You would help us by Your Holy Spirit to be bold witnesses for You. Help us to share the Truth with people, so they too can come to You and be saved. We thank You for loving us so much. In Your name we pray, amen.
Comments