AMOS 7 AND 8 (SUBSTANCE OF A READING)
AMOS 7 AND 8 (SUBSTANCE OF A READING)
The four things shown to Amos by Jehovah at the beginning of chapters 7 and 8 were important instruction for him at that period in the history of Israel, and they are not the less important for us. “Thus did the Lord Jehovah shew unto me; and behold, he formed locusts in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth, and behold, it was the latter growth after the king’s mowings”. “The king’s mowings” have reference to the previous dealings of God with Israel; there had been a long course of His dealings with them from the time that they broke away from Judah. The object His dealings have in view is that what is of God may arise. As we see from 2 Kings 14: 26, 27, there was a remarkable [p. 432] intervention of God just at that time so that there was a period of restoration and recovery, Jeroboam restoring the border of Israel. I think that is what Amos refers to as “the latter growth”. We might compare with it the last hundred years and those from the time of the Reformation. God was obliged, as the departure reached a peak, to do one of two things: to bring in judgment or recovery; and instead of judgment He granted a wonderful time of recovery, and it has been going on ever since, so that it is a time of the latter growth. In Sardis and Philadelphia we get somewhat the thought of the latter growth. Nevertheless God was still dealing with them.
It says that the locusts had “wholly eaten the grass of the land” and that the fire “devoured the great deep, and ate up the inheritance”. It was a serious exercise which brought Amos to his knees — every evidence of revival eaten up! But for the intercession of Christ there would not be anything. The object of God’s public ways is to reduce His people. The ways of God now are all on the line of reduction, because when we are small God can do something with us. Peter, Paul, Jude and John all tell of judgment coming. What is interesting is that the judgment that was about to fall on God’s people had been promised in the days of Jeroboam, Baasha, Ahab and Jehu; but Amos pleads for the people, and in answer to that the judgment was suspended for a while — at least for twenty-five years, for Jeroboam’s reign was long — and space was given for repentance. Then the inheritance was destroyed and the people were carried away to Assyria. This prophetic ministry came in to support the deliverance of God by Jeroboam; that is, there was a moral deliverance to be brought about by the ministry of Amos. Jehovah’s own compassionate feelings were reflected in Amos; and so now the compassions of Christ are expressed in His people. In the prayer meeting supplication is made for the whole Christian profession. Sardis and Philadelphia are the outcome of the compassion of God and of the intercession of Christ. Jehovah suspended the judgment for the sake of the remnant of whom [p. 433] Amos was the representative; the governmental dealings of God and the intercession of Christ go together. Jacob will never rise up unless he is helped; he cannot help himself. I believe that this great war (1939 - 45) is intended by God to reduce His people to dependence on Him; God can do anything with us when we are small. We can plan to do nothing when bombs are falling about us. God’s people are brought down small so that He can do anything with us. What is of God in the establishment around us is being reduced publicly. Evangelical appointments are far fewer than they were fifty or a hundred years ago. Their lost influence is mourned, but the witness will be found with the remnant. It came down to only two of the assembly — “Two of you” — that is a quorum.
There is a great resource in the days of apostasy; what follows is the plumb-line. So that if we accept the exercise of the locusts and the fire, that is, that God is about to deal judicially with everything that displeases Him in the Christian profession, we shall be ready to move on to the wall and the plumb-line. That is to say, separation is a wall built by a plumb-line and not by the will of man; it is the practical working of divine principles. The plumb-line is in the hand of Jehovah; it is the application of divine principles to what exists practically. “Thus did he shew unto me; and behold, the Lord stood upon a wall made by a plumb-line, with a plumb-line in his hand” (verse 7). That is what the Lord has done in the last days of the church’s history; He has set up a testimony in separation to the practicability of divine principles. He was prepared to set up what was right as a testimony in Israel if there had been faithful men, and He is prepared to do it now for the saints of the assembly; and such will have His support, for God is prepared to stand by them as He stood on the wall here.
The fourth thing that Jehovah showed to Amos is in chapter 8; “Thus did Jehovah shew unto me; and behold, a basket of summer-fruit”. “A basket of summer-fruit” I can only suppose to be a symbol of what Jehovah looked for in His [p. 434] people (see Micah 7: 1, 2). It represents what the Spirit of Christ looked for but failed to find, and in one sense that is the most terrible thing of all, to think that the church has so entirely failed to bring forth what the heart of Christ desired. Whatever He looked for in Israel He did not get; and what Christ looks for in His assembly — we know it — He has failed to get. We know well what our basket of summer-fruit is; from the gospels and epistles we can learn what the Lord looks for for the satisfaction of His heart. We can read it; we can pray over it, and we can lament that the Lord gets so little of it. What does He get from me? All these things carry condemnation with them, and if there is a little bit for Christ anywhere what condemnation it is! The object of prophetic ministry is to give us feelings. The prophets are permeated with divine feelings and are jealous for God, as the vehemence of their denunciations shows. That which the saints are for the pleasure of Christ, what He said of them on earth and from heaven — put it all together and what a basket of summer-fruit it is! Then look at the church and see what a failure it is, see how little of it has come into living expression. The ground on which the church will be condemned will be that it has not answered to the pleasure of Christ; instead she has become the “mother of the harlots” — nothing could be more terrible.