While God May Be Found (July 17, 2022)

WHILE GOD MAY BE FOUND

Texts: Isaiah 55:6, Amos 8:1- 2, 8:11- 12

Isaiah 55:6 Seek the Lord while He may be found; call upon Hime while He is near

Amo 8:1 This is what the Lord GOD showed me: behold, a basket of summer fruit. 2 And he said, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then the LORD said to me, “The end has come upon my people Israel; I will never again pass by them. …. 11 “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord GOD, “when I will send a famine on the land— not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD. 12 They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, to seek the word of the LORD, but they shall not find it.

Who likes overripe fruit? Can you do much with overripe fruit? Have you ever had an overripe banana? Beyond making banana bread, the overripe banana is god for nothing. In today’s text God uses overripe fruit in a way that is symbolic.

Who would argue against the understanding that we live in a day when many take God for granted? One thing that eighth chapter of Amos clear is that moving away from God invites destruction. The opening image of ripe fruit cuts to the chase as a metaphor for God’s judgement.

It is lost in the translation from Hebrew to English that ripe fruit is equated with being ripe for judgment. In the original Hebrew, the prophet’s point was far more emphatic because he uses\d a play on words that [is] sic. difficult to communicate in English. “The overt connection between the vision and Israel’s fate was in the word-play based on the similar sounds [between summer and end]… The point of this vision, then, is the finality of judgment” (Hubbard). (David Guzick’s Enduring Word Commentary).

What can we draw from the eighth chapter of Amos that would convict the atheists, naysayers, agnostics and sinners to repent?

Let’s look at prosperity, neglect and judgment.

PROSPERITY

Is prosperity a bad thing?

1) Negligent prosperity: If prosperity increases and our attentiveness to being God’s people begins to decrease and take a back seat, then we are on dangerous ground, because we may quit worshipping God and try to become our own God. Is this not what happened to those in Amos’s audience?

2) Power brokers: When leaders begin to “skimp the measure, boost the prices, and cheat with dishonest scales and exploit the poor” (See Amos 8:5-6 cf. Amos 2:6), they will reap what they have sown! If we sow seeds of neglect, then would we not reap the seeds of neglect?

3) Technological idols: As Christian author Francis Chan points out, “We are a culture that relies on technology over community, a society in which spoken and written words are cheap, easy to come by, and excessive. Our culture says anything goes; fear of God is almost unheard of. We are slow to listen, quick to speak, and quick to become angry”. (Frances Chan. Crazy Love. Colorado Springs, David C. Cook Publishing, 2008, p. 25). Have you seen how this kind of thing happens on Facebook and other social media outlets very day?

4) Lawlessness: In our world, people bend rules, break rules and make new rules when they do not get what they want! Can this kind of mutiny escape its lawless consequences?

What kind of fruit does godless prosperity give to us?

1) Reaping and sowing: The biblical understanding of things is that we will reap what we sow! Godless prosperity is not always a good thing if the fruit of prosperity leads to success that becomes idolatrous. Is our generation any different than the people of Amos’s day? Amos 8 is an oracle that targets the injustice of the nation of Israel.

2) Self-made prisons: Not long after a wealthy contractor had finished building the Tombs prison in New York, he was found guilty of forgery and sentenced to several years in the prison he had built! As he was escorted into a cell of his own making, the contractor said, “I never dreamed when I built this prison that I would be an inmate one day.” Galaxie Software. (2002). 10,000 Sermon Illustrations. Biblical Studies Press: [Origin: Today in the Word, July 12, 1993]). Unless the Lord builds the house, the laborers build in vain (Psalm 127:1).

3) Eternal peace: Material things will never provide the eternal peace that only God can give! Only the blood of Jesus can wash us of our sin and make us right with God!

NEGLIGENCE

How will we prosper if we neglect God and His word? Would we fare well if we neglected God’s life-giving Word? Jesus said that His food was to do the will of God who sent Him (John 4:34).