Scripture Daily

Context No. 3374 of 4322 · Amos

Context · Reflection

Amos 3:11-15: in context

11Therefore the Lord GOD says: “An adversary will overrun the land; and he will pull down your strongholds, and your fortresses will be plundered.” 12The LORD says: “As the shepherd rescues out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear, so shall the children of Israel be rescued who sit in Samaria on the corner of a couch, and on the silken cushions of a bed.” 13“Listen, and testify against the house of Jacob,” says the Lord GOD, the God of Armies. 14“For in the day that I visit the transgressions of Israel on him, I will also visit the altars of Bethel; and the horns of the altar will be cut off, and fall to the ground. 15I will strike the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory will perish, and the great houses will have an end,” says the LORD.

Amos pronounces judgment on a complacent, luxurious Israel. He pictures an enemy overrunning the land, tearing down the strongholds in which they trusted, and leaving only fragments, as a shepherd rescues from a lion's mouth just two legs or a piece of an ear. He names their winter houses and summer houses, their beds of ivory, and the corrupted altars at Bethel.

The image is stark. What they were sure would keep them safe, their fortresses, their wealth, their fine houses, offers no protection when God's judgment comes. Amos targets their two great sins together: self-indulgent ease and false, corrupted worship. A people can grow so comfortable and so secure in their possessions, and so content with an empty religion, that they forget their real vulnerability before God. Wealth is no wall, and outward worship is no shield, when the heart has turned away from him. What we lean on for security can be swept away in a moment.

Have I grown complacent and secure in comfort and outward religion, forgetting that none of it shields me if my heart has turned from God?

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