JOY "God Calls Whom He Chooses" April 1, 2015

April 1, 2015

God Calls Whom He Chooses

Hosea, Joel, Amos and Obadiah

I                 The Prophet and the Prostitute

II                The Revelation of God’s Hand

III            God Doesn’t Play Favorites

IIII           Death to Edom

I                            Hosea----------

(Don Richardson, in his book, Eternity in Their Hearts, tells an amazing story of spiritual harvest. In an area once called Burma, which is now modern Myanmar, lying between China and Thailand, and touching the border of Laos, there lived about a quarter-million tribal people, called the Lahu. For many centuries, the Lahu had a tradition ,which said that the Creator of all things, whom they called Gui’Sha — had given their forefathers his law written on rice cakes! But a famine came, and the forefathers ate the rice cakes for their physical survival. The elders defended their actions by saying that Gui’Sha’s law was now inside them! But the Lahu could not know and obey their Creator perfectly until he would again give them his written laws. The Lahu people had prophets of Gui’Sha, whose mission it was to keep the expectation of help from the Creator constantly alive in the hearts of the people. And so the prophets would teach the people with proverbs like the one which said, “If a man had ten armloads of walking sticks and walked until every walking stick was worn to a stub, he would still not find Gui’Sha [the true God], but when the right time comes, Gui’Sha will send to us a white bother with a white book containing his laws — the word lost by our forefathers so long ago. That white brother will bring the lost book to our very homes!”

Some Lahu even wore cords around their wrists symbolizing their need for a divinely appointed deliverer who would one day cut those cords from their wrists! In the 1890s, a young missionary named William Marfus Young, was appointed to take the gospel to the Shan people in the eastern extremity of Burma. He established a base in Keng Tung city, capital of the Shan region. One day Young went to the marketplace and was preaching among the Shan people, most of whom were Buddhists. He read the Ten Commandments from the Bible. Then holding his Bible aloft — with the sun gleaming on its white pages — he began to preach about the laws of the True God. As he preached, he noticed some men coming toward him out of the throng in the market. He could tell by their dress they were not Shan people. Later he discovered that they were Lahu men who had decided that day to come down from the far mountains to trade in the market of Keng Tung. They completely surrounded William Young and stared incredulously at his white face, the white interior of the book, in his hand, and listened to his description of the laws of God contained in that Book.

When he had finished they pleaded with the missionary to follow them up into the mountains. They said, “We have been waiting for you for centuries. We even have meeting houses built in some of our villages in readiness for your coming.” They showed him the bracelets of coarse rope hanging like manacles from their wrists that their people had worn for many generations. The ropes symbolized their bondage to evil spirits as a result of not having God’s Word. They said, “You alone, as the messenger of God, may cut these manacles from our wrists — but only after you have brought the book of the true God to our very homes.” Young could not believe what was happening, but he went and many of the Lahu people became Christians. In 1904, Young and others baptized 2,200 Lahu converts who had learned the basics of the Christian faith. From then until 1936, when he died, still working among the Lahu, he saw at least 2,000 Lahu give their lives to Christ every year. 

William Young sowed the seed of the Gospel among those Burmese people his whole life---and so did Hosea, Joel. Amos and Obadiah sow the seed of God’s truth among the houses of Israel and Judah-, more than 2000 years before him….and today, we are called to sow that same seed…..whether people listen or ignore us; whether people respond or reject our words; whether people believe or deny that Jesus is their Savior…we are supposed to keep sowing the seed, our whole life long……
If we will sow it, then God will continue to grow it. All iit takes, is a simple and humble heart, that is willing to hear and receive the message and accept its truth. Hosea in 10:11-12, said, “[You] must plow, and. . . break up the ground. Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord, until he comes and showers righteousness on you” 

Hosea was the first of the "minor" prophets.." He was a young preacher in the nation of Israel, the northern kingdom, and he was a contemporary of the prophets Isaiah and Amos. He lived, during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah (kings of Judah, the Southern Kingdom), and during the reign of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, the king of Israel. Jeroboam was one of the wicked kings of Israel and the nation was going through a difficult time when Hosea was preaching. People were busy being about their own business, thinking, that what they were doing was so important, that they didn't have much time for God.. They were kind of the way a lot of people are today, the spirit was willing, but the flesh was ready for the weekend.

So, consequently, people didn't pay much attention to Hosea. He spoke of judgment and of chastisement. He said that God was gong to raise up the Assyrian nation, to punish the children of Israel. He warned that a fierce and ruthless army would sweep across the land like a scourge. But the people paid little attention to him, and they said that Hosea's God must be a pretty vengeful one, if that was his message. Hosea tried to tell them that his God was a God of love and that everything He did was because of that love…He tried to make them understand that God wanted them to see what they were doing to themselves…. and that the only way he could get them to listen, was to make things rough for them. But they didn't pay any more attention than people do today about things like that. Instead, they blamed God and said, "If God is really a God of love, then why does he let things get in such a mess? How could a God of love ever send a ruthless people like the Assyrians down upon our land?"

And so young Hosea found that his audience was diminishing., which was a discouraging thing, so he went to God and God told him to do a strange thing. He wanted Hosea to get married and He had a girl all picked out for him….. Hosea didn’t hesitate…he obeyed God immediately, even though God told him that she would be unfaithful to him, and  not just with one man, but with many men, and tthat eventually,  she would  become nothing but a street prostitute…

 Now undoubtedly Hosea was very puzzled by God's strange command just as Abraham was puzzled by God's command that he take his son to Mt. Moriah, and kill him. God does strange things at times, things we don't always understand, things we can't categorize, things that don't fit into what we think we know of him. And this is one of those strange things. He told Hosea, "I want you to marry this girl and she is going to be a harlot, a common street prostitute. But you are going to have three children, two boys and a girl. And when they are born I want to name them for you. " Maybe, by this time Hosea had figured it out Maybe he had begun to understand a little bit of what God was doing. He would have known that, it was customary in Israel, to teach by symbols –and that names were important and that God often used this method of instructing his people and teaching them certain truths…….  God was planning to use his prophet and his family as an object lesson for his people.

When they had their first child. It was a boy, as God had said. Hosea's heart was filled to bursting, and he went to God for the name of this boy.To his surprise, God picked the name Jezreel, which means means "cast-away" and was a name of shame in Israel. Do you remember the bloody story of Queen Jezebel and Ahab? Ahab cheated his neighbor out of his property and stole his neighbor's vineyard, and Jezebel was the wicked queen who put him up to it God's judgment, eventually fell on her though…. She was looking out of her upper story window one day when a general, Jehu, was down in the courtyard, and he ordered the servants to throw Jezebel out the window. They threw her out and she fell on the pavement and was killed, and the dogs ate her up, and the courtyard has been called Jezreel ever since. (2 Kings 9:30-37)

Nevertheless, that was the name that God picked for Hosea's oldest boy, his first son. And that was the name Hosea gave to his baby, because he understood that God was warning his people: of the coming judgment …. that they too would be cast away, if they didn't recognize the folly of their actions, if they didn't turn from going after idols, and giving way to abominable practices and trying to be like everybody else around them. God was warning them with this baby's name.

In the course of time, another child. a daughter, was born to Hosea. This one was named Loruhamah, which means "not pitied." Imagine naming your little baby girl "not pitied." It meant that God would no longer have pity on his people if they continued their stubborn rebellion. His patience was wearing thin. After hundreds of years of trying to reach this stubborn people, he was warning them that they were getting near the end, and hat a time would come when he would no longer pity them but would hand them over to invading armies.

When this little girl was weaned, Gomer conceived again and bore a third child, another little boy. And this one God named Loammi, which means, "not my people,"  God was saying, "you are not my people and I will not be your God." But even as He promised justice, the Lord God was merciful…. He also promised that there would come a day of restoration:

In Hosea 2:23 God said…."And I will have pity on Not-Pitied,
and I will say to Not-My-People,
'You are my people;'
and he shall say, 'Thou art my God.'" .

Now after this there were no more children in Hosea's household. and Gomer began to fulfill the sad prediction that God had made when he had told Hosea to marry her. What a heartbreak it must have been to this young preacher as he heard the whispers that began to circulate about his wife and about what happened when he was away on preaching trips. Perhaps even his own children may have unconsciously dropped some remarks about the men who visited when Daddy was away. And soon the children were left uncared for while Gomer wasted all her time running around with these other men.

One day Hosea came home and found a note from Gomer: she had decided to find the happiness she felt she deserved, and she was leaving him and the children to follow the man she really loved. You know how those notes go: "Dear John..."

About this time a new tone came into Hosea's preaching. He still warned of the judgment to come and the fact that God was going to send the Assyrians down across the land, but no longer did he announce it with thunder. He spoke to them with tears. And he began to speak of a day when love would at last triumph, when -- after the bitter lesson was learned that there will be consequences to sin…. --Israel would turn back to the God who loved her, and be His people and He would be her God…

But poor Gomer passed from man to man, until at last she fell into the hands of a man who was unable to pay for her food and her clothing. News of her miserable state came to Hosea’s ears, and he sought out the man she was living with and gave him money for food and clothing for her…with me." 

Now you may say, "That's a foolish thing for a man to do"' But who can explain the madness of love? Love exists apart from reason and has its own reasons. Love does not act according to logic. Love acts according to its own nature. And so Hosea acted on the basis of love. 

How long this went on we don't know for sure, but at last word came that Gomer was going to be sold in the slave market. Her current husband had tired of her and she was to be sold as a slave. The brokenhearted prophet didn't know what to do. He went weeping to God. And God said, "Hosea, do you love this woman in spite of all that she has done to you?" Hosea nodded through his tears, and God said. "Then go show your love for her in the same way that I love the nation Israel."

So Hosea went to the marketplace and he watched Gomer be brought up, stripped naked, and placed on the dock for all eyes to see …  The auctioneer probably  pinched her and prodded her to show how strong she was, and then the bidding would have begun. We don’t know if anybody was bidding against Hosea, but we do know that he paid fifteen pieces of silver and a bushel of barley to buy his wife back.

He went to her and put her clothes on her and he led her away by the hand and took her to his home. And then follows, what is probably one of  the most beautiful verses in the whole Bible….. As Hosea led her away he said to her:

"You must dwell as mine for many days; you shall not play the harlot, or belong to another man; so will I also be to you." (Hosea 3:3b RSV)

He pledged his love to her anew. And that was all this poor woman could take. She had gotten down to the very dregs of shame and disgrace, but the love of this man broke her heart, and from this time on Gomer was faithful to Hosea. She became an honest. industrious, faithful wife, and the rest of the book of Hosea simply goes on to tell the effect of this story on the nation of Israel -- God said to them. "How can I give you up?' He reminded them of his love for them all those years. He reminded them of his goodness, and of how again and again they had turned their backs on him. The final picture of the book is one of beauty and glory, for it looks to the day when Israel shall at last return to God -- her true husband -- and shall say, "What have I to do with idols? I have seen him and heard him and he has won my heart."

In the closing chapters of the book, after all the sorrow in the heart of God, we come at last to the final picture:

Return, O Israel, to the Lord your God,
your sins have been your downfall… (Hosea 14:1 RSV)

Because it wasn't God who was to blame. He was simply trying to get them to see the truth. And the only thing that could relieve their agony is to return. That's always the case…… God can't bless us or restore us until we come back. 

And so God says:

“Take with you words and return to the Lord; say to him,
Take away all iniquity;
accept that which is good
and we will render the fruit of our lips"[That is praise.]
Assyria shall not save us,
we will not ride upon horses [no military power is going to avail]
and we will say no more, 'Our God,'
to the work of our hands [idolatry].
In You, the orphan finds mercy." (Hosea 14:2-3 RSV)

God's response is:

I will heal their faithlessness;
I will love them freely,
for my anger has turned from them,
I will be as the dew to Israel;
he shall blossom as the lily,
he shall strike root as the poplar;
his shoots shall spread out; his beauty shall be like the olive,
and his fragrance like Lebanon.
They shall return and dwell beneath my shadow,
they shall flourish as a garden;
they shall blossom as the vine,
their fragrance shall be like the wine of Lebanon.

Men will dwell again in His shade

He will flourish like the grain

He will blossom like a vine

And his fame will be like the wine from Lebanon

O Ephraim, what more have I to do with idols?

I will answer him and care for him.

I am like a green pine tree

Your fruitfulness comes from me….

And then , from 14:9, Hosea adds this lesson from his own heartache and the joy of his restored love:

“Whoever is wise, let him understand these things;
whoever is discerning, let him know them;
for the ways of the LORD are right,
and the upright walk in them,
but transgressors stumble in them. 

Can you see in this beautiful story all the elements of the eternal triangle? There is the loving God, the faithless human heart, and the deceptive attractiveness of the world.

This is your story and my story isn't it? So many times we try to satisfy ourselves with the lying idols of self-importance or wealth or a good time. Ours is the blindness that like Gomer's, can’t distinguish between lust and love.

We try to run from God and drown our miseries in empty pleasures, or work, or social life …but as surely as we think we’ve escaped, as surely as we think 

We’ve run far enough, God touches our sleeve, with his love, and says, “My child, my name and my nature are love, and I must act according to what I am. When you tire of all your running and your wandering and your heartbreak, I'll be there to draw you to myself again."

And, this is the story of the Scriptures, isn't it? At Bethlehem, God entered the slave market where the whole human race was putting itself up for auction, prostituting itself to a cheapened life. But on the cross, the Lord Jesus paid the price, the full price for our freedom, and bought us back. This is the story of God's love and God's heart -- his loving desire to dwell with His people and for His people to dwell with Him…..

Joel--------

(Jeffery is not an avid cook, but he can hold his own in any kitchen. As the youngest child in the Honiara extended, dysfunctional family, he spent many hours reluctantly tied to his mother’s apron springs. Often, he would find himself assisting her in the daily chores around the house. She taught him the finer points of housekeeping. By age seven, she taught him how to cook. However, the assignment as the baby of the family, was nowhere close to being fun.

When she suddenly died, those tasks became his job. Jeffery knew how to make up the beds, clean the rooms, and cook as well as wash dishes. Repeatedly, his siblings would cruelly taunt him for doing woman’s work. Often, he would run and hide in the small pantry in the kitchen. Jeffery would curl up in a tight ball as the infinitesimal sounds of his whimpering filled the air.
One day, his father came home after a long day at work to find Jeffery running into the closet. After the boy slammed the door shut, the father walked over and lightly knocked on the doorframe.
Jeffery shouted, "Who is it? Leave me alone. I am never coming out."
The father knocked on the doorframe again and said, "Jeff, it is me. Can I come in?"
After hesitating for a brief second, Jeffery opened the door. The boy exclaimed as his father’s large body squeezed into the small space, "I am still not coming out."
"okay, so what is wrong, Jeff?"
With teary eyes, the lad peered up into his father’s concerned face and said, "They keep calling me names and stuff cause they say I do women work."
His father gently placed the palm of his large hand against the boy’s cheek. His long finger brushed aside a teardrop as he said, "Listen, son, don’t worry about what they say. Before your mother died two years ago, she taught you everything. She did that because she knew she could trust you to take care of the family. She knew that you wouldn’t let her down and you wouldn’t let me down. She knew that you would do the job as long as you need to, even if it’s a thankless job, even if you get picked on, she knew that you would keep doing your job...Thank you son, for doing your job… )"

The little book of Joel is only three chapters long….and as  the prophecy of Hosea reveals the heart of God, the prophecy of Joel reveals the hand of God, the hand that controls destiny, the hand that moves history.

Ray Stedman says “that for centuries, men have been looking for the principle upon which all the events of history turn, and ever since the dawn of history there have been many guesses about what that controlling principle is. Long ago, the great Greek philosophers came up with the idea that history moves in cycles; and a leading modern historian, Arnold Toynbee, agrees with that. Aristotle also said that history follows this kind of course. He said that first a tyrant rises, a man of iron, who seizes control of a nation or a group of people and rules until his dynasty ends. Then control gradually passes to a ruling family of aristocracy. And gradually their power deteriorates until control passes down to the people, and this is what he calls a democracy. But a democracy also deteriorates and gradually yields to the breakdown of all power, and anarchy ensues. Out of anarchy a tyrant again seizes control, and on goes the cycle of history. And there is a lot of truth in that theory.

Through the centuries other men have contributed guesses about the controlling principle of life. Thomas Jefferson thought it was political, and when he wrote the Declaration of Independence he incorporated that idea in the prologue -- that human governments recognize that certain inalienable rights are granted to men, and that to preserve these rights, governments are instituted among men. He felt that the forces that shape human history and form the nations of earth are political in nature.

Back in the last century, Karl Marx dipped his pen into the acid of his own embittered spirit and wrote the great work that has dramatically influenced our modern times. His idea was that the controlling force of history was economics, that it is the need to meet the material demands of life that shapes the course of history. He called this force dialectical materialism -- the principle of materialism arrived at through debate, through discussion of these issues. And this idea has so seized the minds of men today that all over the earth are millions who feel that economics is the controlling interest of life.

Others have said that the principle is sociological. H.G. Wells, for instance, was one of a great number of thinkers who said that evolution shapes the course of human destiny. It is often taught in schools today that behind all the events of human history recorded in our daily newspapers and by historians there is an evolutionary principle always trending higher and higher, making life better and better. But the Bible says that all these are wrong. The Bible says that behind the whole course of human history is God. The hinge on which history turns is spiritual -- God's Spirit is at work among men, and you cannot understand human events if you do not first recognize that fact.

One of the most meaningful statements ever written in the scriptures and one of the most terrifying things that can ever be heard by men was said at the time of the flood when God told Noah, "My Spirit shall not strive with man forever." (Genesis 6:3 NASV) And whenever that statement is uttered it means that judgment is at hand. For God's Spirit strives with man, by patiently restraining evil so that human life can go on. God tries to win men to himself by holding back the, destructive forces in human events. But at last God's patience reaches an end and there comes a time -- repeated throughout human history -- when God says either to an individual or to a nation, "My Spirit shall not always strive with men." And when he removes his Spirit -- the controlling force of life -- everything collapses. That is when catastrophe occurs and judgment strikes. And that is essentially the message of the book of Joel.”

This young man Joel was a prophet to the kingdom of Judah, the southern kingdom. He was probably a contemporary of Isaiah, Hosea, and Amos. We don't know much about Joel, but he was one of the most far-sighted men who have ever written, even in the pages of the word of God. Joel saw clear to the end of human history, far past our own day to the final stages of God's dealing with human events; and he links it all to a great dramatic occurrence in his own day. And he doesn’t stop proclaiming it to the people….God had given him a job to do, and he did it until he could do it no more…. 

The book opens with his call to the people to consider a tremendous thing that has happened in that land. He says:

“Hear this, aged men, give ear, all inhabitants of the land! (Joel 1:2a RSV):

Hear this...
Has such a thing happened in your days,
or in the days of your fathers?
Tell your children of it,
and let your children tell their children,
and their children another generation. (Joel 1:2-3 RSV)

Joel says that there is going to be an event of such transcending importance that people will be talking about it for years and years to come….the great day of the Lord….  and God called Joel to describe this great day.

The day of the Lord is not just one event in human history. We find in Joel’s prophecy, that the day of the Lord is any event where God acts in judgment, at any time, building up into to the final, great and terrible day of the Lord. that Joel explains in chapters 2 and 3.

The great and terrible day of the Lord, is that period described by the Lord Jesus Christ, as a time when there will be tribulation, as has never been seen, since the creation of the world, nor ever will be. And it was given to the prophet Joel to see across the intervening centuries of time, and to describe it, and to illustrate it by events taking place in his own day.

…
God called prophets to preach their warnings for the same reason
that  God gives us the gift of time……
so that everyone has the opportunity to repent and come back to Him.

 Joel’s whole book is about the day of the Lord coming…The Day of the Lord is Near; and the Coming Judgment. Joel 1:1-15

This judgment centers on the warning of a plague of locusts which is an unbelievable disaster…..

Illustration: History records a similar event. Let me read to you: In 1915 a plague of locusts covered Palestine and Syria from the border of Egypt to the Taurus Mountains. The first swarms appeared in March. These were adult locusts that came from the northeast and moved toward the southwest in clouds so thick they obscured the sun. The females were 2.5 to 3 inches long, and they immediately began to lay eggs by digging holes in the soil about four inches deep and depositing about 100 eggs in each. The eggs were neatly arranged in a cylindrical mass about one inch long and about thick as a pencil. These holes were everywhere. Witnesses estimated that as many as 65,000-75,000 eggs were concentrated in a single square meter of soil, and patches like this covered the entire land from north to south. Having laid their eggs the locusts flew away.
Within a few weeks the young locusts hatched. These resembled large ants. They had no wings, and within a few days they began moving forward by hopping along the ground like fleas. They would cover four to six hundred feet a day, devouring any vegetation before them. By the end of May they had molted. In this stage they had wings, but they still did not fly. Instead they moved forward by walking, jumping only when they were frightened. They were bright yellow. Finally the locusts molted again, this time becoming the fully developed adults that had invaded the land initially.
According to a description of this plague by John D. Whiting in the December 1915 issue of National Geographic Magazine, the earlier stages of these insects attacked the vineyards. “Once entering a vineyard the sprawling vines would in the shortest time be nothing but bare bark. When the daintier morsels were gone, the bark was eaten off the young topmost branches, which, after exposure to the sun, were bleached snow-white. Then seemingly out of malice, they would gnaw off small limbs, perhaps to get at the pith within." Whiting describes how the locusts of the last stage completed the destruction begun by the earlier form." They attacked the olive trees, whose tough, bitter leaves had been passed over by the creeping locusts. They stripped every leaf, berry, and even the tender bark." They ate away "layer after layer" of the cactus plants, "giving the leaves the effect of having been jackplaned. Even on the scare and prized palms they had no pity, gnawing off the tenderer ends of the sword like branches and, diving deep into the heart, they tunneled after the juicy pith."

That is what happened in Israel. A locust horde had descended upon the land and devoured every living thing. The crops were all ruined and a famine had come. And Joel called their attention to what was happening. They hardly needed for him to, everyone could certainly see what was happening -- but what they couldn’t see, was who or where it was coming from…

Joel said to them, "God is behind this." He went on to describe how "the fields are laid waste, the ground mourns because the grain is destroyed" (1:10), and then he says:

Sanctify a fast,
call a solemn assembly.
Gather the elders
and all the inhabitants of the land
to the house of the Lord your God;
and cry to the Lord.
Alas for the day!
For the day of the Lord is near,
and as destruction from the Almighty it comes. (Joel 1:14-15 RSV))

He was saying, God is behind this. This didn't just happen. This isn't just one of those freaks of nature. This happened in obedience to the command of God, working through the natural laws that govern human life, and there is a lesson for us in this. "Don't fail to heed the lesson," this prophet says, "for if you learn the lesson now -- this minor-league example of the day of the Lord -- you will save yourself the awful heartache that will come at last in the great and terrible day of the Lord." Joel is simply pointing out that God's hand is allowing catastrophes like this to occur to make people aware of the spiritual background to life. Life is not just a cycle of eating and drinking and getting money to do what we want to. Because behind all the commonplace things of life, there is the controlling hand of the Spirit of God. Man needs to wake up to the fact that God is talking to him, that God has something to say to him. God wants to bless man but man will not listen. That is the problem. And God shakes him up with something to make him listen. Has that ever happened to you? Has God ever done anything to you,, that made you suddenly aware? Perhaps some terrible thing happened to make you realize that things weren't as good as you thought they were; you began to listen, realizing that there was something you needed to hear.

 God called Joel to wake the people up with an explanation of the locust invasion…and Joel engaged with the suffering so much that it becomes to him (and the voice of the Lord) a springboard to look at the ‘end days’….

And I think that’s how it us for ALL of us. In one sense- we can’t help but have that happen. When we think at all the turmoil in the middle east… we can’t help but wonder if it’s the beginning of  the end,,,
- and in one sense it is! 

All these things  that we see happening , are reminders, birth pains, pre-shocks of:
• what will be the end
• the fact that the world is not cyclical,  but is moving towards a climax Ending
• the fact that God will bring to an end all the evil of the world… this world itself… and all that offends Him

Joel has a lot to say about the future.  His is a book of immediate problems, disaster and darkness- but out of it, and through it, shines God’s light of hope and His wonderful promises for the future
- never, in God’s economy, is there pain without His precious future promises

But there’s present promises and hope, too.
If there is repentance, if the people return to God, rend their hearts and not their garment… truly repent and are contrite….Then the locusts will not be the end of the story! And the day of the Lord will continue to be sometime in the future….

and we have to understand just as they did in Joel’s day,  that it’s not remorse, that the Lord God is looking for,. It’s repentance and contrition. 

Joel 2:12 says, “Even now,  declares the Lord, ”return to me with  all your heart, with fasting, weeping and mourning.”

( a little girl in Sunday school said ‘repentance is being sorry for what you’ve done wrong’, and a boy added ‘yeah- but it’s being sorry enough to quit’)

And then, After repentance comes Restoration….. Joel 2:28-3:20
Present and future restoration……
The promise of God, in returning to him, that he will restore :
• agriculture……. (2;18 “I am sending you grain, new wine and oil, enough to satisfy you fully”)
• esteem ……2;19 ‘never again will I make you an object of scorn to the nations’
• autumn & spring rains. One rain to start the crop growing. The other rain to really boost the harvest

Jesus can restore our soul. Often it starts small- with a shower that enables the ground to bud again. So- we have to be patient!!
• Then, later- His rain comes, again, and the fruit really appears

The message of Jesus is a message about clean slates, fresh starts and restored ground.
JOEL 2:25  says,"that Ithe Lord will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten--the great locust and the young locust, the other locusts and the locust swarm--my great army that I sent among you.

JOEL 2:26 that the Lord will make sure that you will have plenty to eat, until you are full, and you will praise the name of the LORD your God, who has worked wonders for you; never again will my people be shamed.

JOEL 2:27 Then you will know that I am in Israel, that I am the LORD your God, and that there is no other; never again will my people be shamed.


so. the critical question is,,, Have we found that salvation, deliverance, shelter and strength which only the Lord can provide when the final "day of the Lord" does come?

FW Farrar said, “Sometimes as we float down the river of life, memory flashes up from the hidden depths, and the dark wave is peopled with the innumerable faces of once-forgotten sins which menace us from the waters and prophecy of death. But God can enable us to gaze unshudderingly on these faces, and say with thankful emotion, “These sins are not mine. They were mine, but they are forgiven.

In chapter 3, Joel begins to talk about the end times and beyond. . he sees the great mark of the Spirit's presence: but beyond that he sees that God will restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem:

"I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat[of judgment] and I will enter into judgment with them there..." (Joel 3:2a RSV)

Jesus said, "When the Son of man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him...Before him will be gathered all the nations" (Matthew. 25:31, 32), and then the Son of man shall judge them and shall say to the righteous, as a man divides the sheep from the goats, "Come and enter into the inheritance of my Father," and to the unrighteous, "Depart from me." This is the valley of judgment. In preparation for this God instructs the nations of the world with amazing words, startling words:

“Proclaim this among the nations:
Prepare war,
stir up the mighty men.
Let all the men of war draw near,
let them come up.
Beat your plowshares into swords,
and your pruning hooks into spears...” (Joel 3:9-10a RSV)

Many times you have heard quoted, "Beat your swords into plowshares and your spears into pruning hooks." This is found in the third chapter of Micah; but in Joel quite the opposite is said. And Joel's prophecy comes first; the fulfillment of Joel's prediction comes first. That is why nations are at war. This is what God is saying to the nations today. And they will remain at war in one way or another until God says, "Beat your swords into plowshares and your spears into pruning hooks." Just as Jesus said "And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars... nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom" (Matthew. 24:6-7), and so it shall be until the end. This is what Joel says.

Then we come to another verse that is often quoted:

“Multitudes, multitudes
in the valley of decision!
For the day of the LORD is near
in the valley of decision.
The sun and the moon are darkened,
and the stars withdraw their shining.” (Joel 3:14-15 RSV)

This is the great and terrible day of the Lord that is to come. What does this mean "Multitudes, multitudes, in the valley of decision"? Ray Stedman says that he’s  heard many evangelistic messages on this passage that present a picture of many thousands waiting in the moment of decision, hanging between the choice of heaven and hell. And that maybe it is justifiable to interpret it that way, but RAY STEDMAN SAYS, that isn't what this verse means. It isn't man's decision that is talked about here -- it is God's. God will enter the valley of decision and the multitudes of the nations will be gathered before him. All the world will be there on this judgment day: The decision will have already been made….

And the Lord roars from Zion,
and utters his voice from Jerusalem,
and the heavens and the earth shake.
But the Lord is a refuge to his people,
a stronghold to the people of Israel. (Joel 3:16 RSV)

Now that is the day of the Lord -- the final day of judgment of the living nations of earth at the return of Jesus Christ -- and the effect will be as the prophet describes it:

"So you shall know that I am the Lord your God,
who dwell in Zion, my holy mountain.
And Jerusalem shall be holy..." (Joel 3:17a RSV)

After all, that is what God is always seeking. Because that is what he desires for us…… God deals with us in judgment. When things begin to go wrong with us, it is God's way of saying to us, "Look, you are not your own boss. You are not your own. You are bought with a price. I am God." He is waiting for us to realize that he is God -- not us. We don't have the right to run our own live. We don't have the right to do with our live whatever we please. He alone has that right.

"And Jerusalem shall be holy and strangers shall never again pass through it." (Joel 3:17 RSV)

The final scene is a beautiful one:

"And in that day
the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and the hills shall flow with milk,
and all the stream beds of Judah shall
flow with water;
and a fountain shall come forth from the house of the Lord
and water the valley of Shittim." (Joel 3:18 RSV)

Water is always a picture of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said. "He who believes in me, as the Scripture has said, 'Out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water'" (John 7:38) -- rivers of blessing to satisfy man's thirsty soul.

The future is in God's hands. It isn't in men's hands. If it were, we would make a mess of it. It isn't in the Devil's hands. If it were, we would be on our way to destruction -- everyone, without fail. The blind principle of historical determinism isn't guiding the future. If it were, there would be no meaning to life. The future is in the hands of one who is preparing something that eye has never seen and ear has never heard. Neither has it ever entered into the heart of man, the wonderful things that God is preparing for those who love him. I believe that.

Every moment that God deals with us in judgment, he is capturing our attention, waking us up. Through these difficult things. God in grace is simply saying to us, "Look and listen. Stop and wait. Pay attention now, so that you will be ready for the great things yet to come."

SPONSORED 

III                                              Amos:------

(Few people have encountered a lion on its terms and lived to tell about it.
One who did was Beryl Markham. In her autobiography West with the Night she tells of the time as a little girl growing up in Africa in the early 1900’s when she came face to face with a lion. She was running playfully through the fields surrounding her family’s farm and suddenly came within twenty yards of the lion. The lion lay sprawled in the morning sun; it was huge, with a thick black-mane, his tail was moving slowly, stroking the rough grass like a knotted end of a rope. His body was sleek and easy; rusty-red, soft looking.. He wasn’t asleep, only idle. She stood there, scuffling her bare toes in the dust. Then the lion raised himself and began to look her over. She knew the rules about lions. She did not run. Trying not to look scared she walked away very slowly, and began to sing a song. Then she started to trot toward the rim of the low hill where she hoped some thick bushes would give her protection. She writes:
The country was gray-green and dry, and the sun lay on it closely, making the ground hot under my bare feet. There was no sound, no wind. Even the lion made no sound, coming swiftly behind me. What I remember most clearly of the moment that followed...a scream that was barely a whisper, a blow that struck me to the ground, and as I buried my face in my arms I felt the lion’s teeth close on [my flesh]. I remained conscious, but I closed my eyes and tried not to be. It was not so much the pain as it was the sound. The sound of the lion’s roar in my ears will only be duplicated… when the gates of hell slip their wobbly hinges one day, and give voice and authenticity to the whole panorama of Dante’s poetic nightmares. It was an immense roar that encompassed the world and dissolved me in it. I shut my eyes very tight and lay still under the weight of the lion’s paws. (61-63)
Is this what we should really mean when we talk about knowing Jesus in a personal way? Isn’t this what the prophet Hosea meant when he wrote of the Messiah (11:10) "He will roar like a lion. When he roars his children will come trembling..." or the prophet Amos (3:8) "The lion roared-who will not fear. The sovereign Lord has spoken, who can but prophecy?”)

The message of Amos, is somewhat different from that of the rest of the prophets, and has been singled out as unique. The message of this book is basically to declare the impartiality of God. God plays no favorites. He makes no allowances for one person that he will not make for others as well. There is no such thing as being God's fair-haired boy. He does not give any more to one than he does to another, in accordance with the promises that he makes. Anybody who is willing to fulfill the conditions of God’s promises, will find his blessing poured out upon them, regardless of who they are; and any who presume upon these conditions will find him sitting in judgment upon them and his Word condemning them, no matter who they are. This is the message of Amos.

It is hard for us to believe that, isn't it? We are so conditioned to thinking that God reacts the way man does, and that if you get into his favor you can presume upon his goodness. Or we think that perhaps we can get by and not face the same kind of judgment that someone else will, or that we can win special positions, special privileges from God that no one else can have. Both extremes of this attitude are reflected in various groups and individuals from time to time.

The book of Amos, however, is a clear statement that God is not like this at all. Therefore, the message of this book can have the impact of a sudden fist in the face. If you really think that you are in a privileged position, especially with God, this book comes with brutal, shocking, breath-taking force. The tendency in human hearts is either to regard ourselves as favored individuals or the exact reverse -- to say that we are such poor creatures and such miserable failures that God would never look at us, that other people have all the right to God' s favor. I think this tendency is universal among us. We are always saying to ourselves, "Why should this happen to me?" when tragedy strikes, or when someone else is honored, we say, "Why shouldn't it happen to me?"

I have a friend who, whenever something in her life goes wrong, her first reaction is always, “why is this happening to me”…and I always want to say back to her, what I said to my children when they said that something wasn’t fair,”,,the only thing that isn’t fair,..is that th”e Lord Jesus Christ died on a cross for you, everything else is just life…

When the prophet Amos came to the northern kingdom of Israel this was exactly the reaction he got. The people of that region looked at him like he had two heads, they couldn’t understand what the prophecy meant to them….they didn’t think they deserved any punishment…they thought they were entitled to continue on in their same ways forever…... They were disgusted with him.

Their attitude was….Why us? Why not go someplace else? You can see this reflected in the biographical sketches that are given to us in this book. The book opens with these words:

“The words of Amos, who was among the shepherds of Tekoa, which he saw concerning Israe,l in the days of Uzziah, king of Judah and in the days of Jeroboamd the son of Joash, king of Israel, two years before the earthquake.”(Amos 1:1 RSV)

That definitely dates this book and the prophet Amos as a contemporary of the prophet Hosea and also of Isaiah in the southern kingdom. He was one of the earliest of the prophetic writers. 

And the thing that makes Amos different is that he wasn’t a trained prophet. He was a layman. Some suggest that since he called himself a herdsman, or a shepherd ----- that it may have marked him with disfavor in the eyes of the people, because shepherds weren’t thought of very highly…but at any rate his message was not acceptable to them.

(In chapter 7 Amos adds another personal note. Here is the reaction to his message as he came to this Northern Kingdom, from the southern kingdom…

Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, "Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos has said,
'Jeroboam shall die by the sword,
and Israel must go into exile
away from his land.'" (Amos 7:10-11 RSV)

That was the burden of the prophet' s message. God was going to exile Israel. God was going to judge the nation and the king.

And Amaziah said to Amos, "O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, and eat bread there, and prophesy there." (Amos 7:12 RSV)

Amaziah says, "Don't come to us. God back to your home town. Go back to the country you came from and prophesy down there."

"But never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king's sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom." (Amos 7:13 RSV)

And sturdy, rugged Amos, with his country background and his bluntness said (verse 14a):

"I am no prophet, nor a prophet's son..." (Amos 7:14b RSV)

That means, "I have not been to the school of the prophets." He didn't mean that his father was not a prophet. He means that he had not been to the accepted school of the prophets.

"...but I am a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees[a farmer], and the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, 'Go, prophesy to my people Israel.'" (Amos 7:14b-15 RSV)

This passage helps us to see something of the opposition to the message of this man as he came declaring the burden of the Lord in the land of Israel in the northern kingdom…..and why they found his message very hard to accept.)

Amos went about delivering God's message in a very interesting way. If you had a map of Israel and could locate the countries that are mentioned here, and if you put Israel right in the center of the map, you would find that Amos is going around the boundaries of Israel in various directions, delivering a message concerning all the neighboring nations. He begins first in chapter 1 with Damascus. That is way up in the northeast section above Israel. He deliverd to Damascus a message showing Israel how God has judged Damascus, especially for the people's cruelty. Then he moved way down on the west coast to the ancient land of of Gaza. And once again he reminded Israel that God has judged them because the people had participated in an active slave trade.

Then he moved back up the coast to the land of Tyre, on the northwest side of Israel, and there he pointed out how God had judged their country because the people had broken their agreements. Then he moved on down to the far south of Israel to the land of Edom, the ancient country of Esau, and here he pointed out how God's judgment had fallen upon their nation because of the people's unforgiving spirit and their implacable hatred of Israel. Then he moved back up the east side of Israel to the land of Ammon. (By the way, Ammon is now the country of Jordan, and its capital is the capital of ancient Ammon.) Here he points out that God had judged this section of the country because of its its greed, and its hunger for land of others. Then south to Moab, still on the side of Israel, God had judged Moab, he says, because of its hatred against Israel. And then he came to the Southern Kingdom, Judah itself, and in a brief reference, points out that because Judah has despised God's law, the judgment of God had fallen on it, too. At then, at last, he finally arrived right at the ten-kingdom northern nation of Israel, and there he announced that God was going to judge them for the corruption and injustice in their hearts. 

The people of Israel were quite untroubled as long as Amos was talking about the other nations. They took it very complacently, more or less with the attitude, of "Well, they got what was coming to them." But when the prophet zeroed in on Israel, the people got angry and said, "Why don't you go away and preach someplace else?" 

Beginning with chapter 3 you have the prophet's words that God addressed to this nation. He begins by pointing out to them that they were a people who had a special, privileged position before God:

Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O people of Israel, against the whole family ,which I brought up out of the land of Egypt. (Amos 3:1 RSV)

 Amos' message. Got their attention, And he said,

"You only have I known
of all the families of the earth; ..." (Amos 3:2a RSV)

That’s what they wanted to hear. This was the sign that they were the privileged people of God, the chosen people. They were the ones of whom God himself had said that he had known of all the families of the earth. You can see them swelling with pride and arrogance as the prophet says this. And then, comes the fist in the face, the hammer blow.

"...therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities." (Amos 3:2b RSV)

The mark of their pride, their place as God’s chosen people, was the very reason God said they were peculiarly subject to judgment. Light creates responsibility. Privilege exposes to the most critical of of judgments….. to whom much is given, much is required….And as these people had been called into such a relationship with the Lord God,, that made them also subject to the severest and sternest forms of judgment. They had been given the privilege and opportunity of walking and talking with God, you can’t get much closer than that….

Now this is what Peter means in the New Testament when he says, "The time has come for judgment to begin with the household of God" (1 Peter. 4:17). It always begins there. God always starts with his people, and then he moves out to those round about them. The prophet's word for us is, that just  because we are people of God, doesn’t mean that God's word doesn’t sit in judgment on the wrong, in our lives….we get no special privilege. On the contrary, more is required of us….(Griff and his desire to go to Millbrook, he said to me, “you and daddy want me to be a witness, you and daddy say, “to whom much is given, much is required, how can I do that if I’m only surrounded by people who are just like me..?”)  

Amos didn’t take long to tell the people of the Northern Kingdom what their specific crime was that had brought it to a head…  remember the story of the two golden calves that were erected by King Jeroboam in the cities of Bethel and Dan? in 1 Kings. 12:28, ……Israel was sent to worship there and the people called those calves Jehovah. And they worshipped and bowed down before those golden images. Those two calves represented two basic ideas in Israel, that God had to continually punish them for….we, today have just as a hard of a time with them and they are still just as wrong…. .

Those golden calves, were made of gold, which represented the hunger of the people for material gain, the love of wealth…. Materialism,,,, the god of gold. 

And because they were calves, or young bullocks, they were representative of the pagan gods of sex,….the fertility gods of the nations around them….. who worshipped the bull as a sign of fertility or sexual potency. 

So the worship of these twin calves made of gold, was essentially symbolic of the people's worship of materialism and sex. That sounds awfully modern, doesn't it? And the prophet's word to this people was, that because of their participating in that kind of worship, the nation of Assyria was being raised up, by God, to come sweeping down from the north to carry Israel away into captivity.

in the patience of God it was almost two hundred years, before Assyria., came and destroyed them… but God announced his warning early, as He always does….so that the people might have a chance to repent,,,  And Amos declared that the judgment was a certainty,  unless the people turned their hearts and minds back to God…  the prophet reminded them of how God had patiently tried to awaken them. He listed five different times, when God had sent something to wake them up, to make them think, to jar them, to arrest them, and stop them in their downward course. He says:

"I gave you cleanness of teeth in all your cities,
and lack of bread in all your places[i.e. famine],
yet you did not return to me..." (Amos 4:6 RSV)

"And I also withheld the rain from you...
I would send rain upon one city,
and send no rain upon another city, (Amos 4:7a RSV)
[God was deliberately spacing the rain so that there would be an awareness that this was the divine hand.]

" ...yet you did not return to me, (Amos 4:8b RSV)

"I smote you with blight and mildew;
I laid waste your gardens...
yet you did not return to me. (Amos 4:9 RSV)

"I sent among you a pestilence after the manner of Egypt;
I slew your young men with the sword;
I carried away your horses...
yet you did not return to me, (Amos 4:10 RSV)

"I overthrew some of you,
as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah... (Amos 4:11a RSV)
[that is, by volcanic action, burning and so on]
yet you did not return to me." (Amos 4:11c RSV)

Again and again God says this. This is an indication that God often sends things into our lives to shake us up, to awaken us. We’ve seen this so many times with individuals, nations and natural disasters..... there may be no direct assurance that whatever it is, indicates that it‘s a judgment of God, but it’s looked at by the individual, or the nation, and rightly so, as a warning or shaking up, as if God were saying, "Look now. Stop and think about where you are going and what is happening to you." Because  God, in His great patience, is constantly trying to make us see things the way they really are.)

And then as the prophet moves on he puts his finger on the very thing that is wrong:

Therefore because you trample upon the poor
and take from him exactions of wheat,
you have built houses of hewn stone,
but you shall not dwell in them;
you have planted pleasant vineyards,
but you shall not drink their wine.
For I knew how many are your transgressions,
and how great are your sins --
you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe,
and turn aside the needy in the gate.
Therefore he who is prudent will keep silent in such a time. (Amos 5:11-13a RSV)

Now this is the reason this book is so loved by the liberals; Amos is called the prophet of social justice, the man who demanded that man treat their fellow-man rightly. Liberals love this book because of these thundering pronouncements against the social evils of Amos' day -- and rightly so. God is always disturbed by social injustices. But what the liberals seem to miss in this book is Amos' appeal to these people. He doesn't just say to them, "Now stop doing these things." He does say that, but that isn't all he says. It is how to stop doing these things that is the important message, and you will find it plainly given twice in chapter 5:

For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel:
"Seek me and live." (Amos 5:4 RSV)
["Don't go to Bethel. Don't go to those golden calves. Seek me and live."]

What is the answer to the wandering heart? The answer isn't just to clean up your life. It is to come back to God. It is to repent and to think again. Turn. Come back to the Lord of your salvation. Call upon him. Ask him to set you back on your feet and straighten out your life. That is the answer. That is always God's appeal. Come back into a relationship with one who loves and in patience tries to awaken us and bring us back to himself.

The nation evidently went on resisting the appeal of the prophet, so he addresses two particular messages to these people, aimed at the two extreme views among the people of Israel. They are almost contradictory views. First he says:

Woe to those who desire the day of the Lord! (Amos 5:18a RSV)

And to the other group, he says:

"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion..." (Amos 6:1a RSV)

Now here are two quite distinct views among the people. There were those whom we might call the pious hypocrites who first came under the judgment of God. "Woe to you who desire the day of the Lord!" What does this mean? Well, you see, there were some people who were going about saying, "Oh, isn't this a terrible day. Oh, God is so hard. Things are so terrible." They were wringing their hands, appearing to be mourning, and going through all kinds of rituals and religious ceremonies and saying, "Oh, there is no hope for anything. Oh, if God would only come at last! Oh, would that the day of the Lord would come. Would that we could go home to be in heaven." Did you ever hear that? And the prophet thunders: "Woe to you that desire the day of the Lord."

Amos says, "Do you know what that day will be like? Do you have any idea what you are saying? Why," he says, "it is darkness, not light. It is as if a man fled from a lion, and a bear met him; or he went into the house and leaned a hand against the wall and a snake bit him. You talk about the day of the Lord. Why, you don't know what you are talking about! Woe to you." And God says,

"...I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your[religious activities] solemn assemblies...your burnt offerings...Take away from me the noise of your songs; ...the melody of your harps... But let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an everflowlng stream." (Amos 5:21-24 RSV)

Do we ever get away from this? God desires truth in the inward parts, in the center of life -- not outward conformity. God sees through that sham and pretense without the slightest difficulty and it doesn't impress him when we go through religious activity. "Thou desirest truth in the inward being." (Psalm 51:6)

( Then there was another group that said, "We are not concerned about these things. Let's eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. Let's have as good a time as we can and make the most of life; let's enjoy it to the full while we can." And the prophet says, "Woe to those who are at ease in Zion."

Amos asks, "How can you be so restful when the nation is so restless? How can you content yourselves with riches and wealth and the good things of life when people are lying in distress outside in the streets and judgment is taken away from your courts?" So there comes this powerful message:

"Woe to those who lie upon beds of ivory,
and stretch themselves upon their couches,
and eat lambs from the flock,
and calves from the midst of the stall;
who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp..." (Amos 6:4- 5a RSV)

...in the midst of the threatening judgment of God? These are the two extreme groups. As Amos goes on, he shows in a series of visions that were given to him that the nation is rapidly ripening for judgment.

At last there comes the final scene that is almost always pictured by the prophets -- a scene of beauty, peace, and glory. 

It reveals what God wants and why God is so angry at hypocrisy. Listen to these words:

"In that day I will raise up
the booth of David that is fallen
and repair its breaches,
and raise up its ruins,
and rebuild it as in the days of old. " (Amos 9:11 RSV)

Do you remember where that is quoted in the New Testament? In the first council at Jerusalem, in Acts 15, when they were wondering whether God would save the Gentiles without the law of Moses, James stood up and quoted this verse from Amos. "The prophets," he said, "have declared that God is going to send his grace out to the Gentiles," and he quoted this verse. (Acts 15:15-18) God's word was that he would raise up the tabernacle or the booth of David which had fallen, and repair its breaches. That is a picture of the coming of Christ, representing the house of David. 

And in the raising up of the Lord Jesus, the word was to go out to all the peoples. God would bless the world through him,

"...that they may possess the remnant of Edom
and the nations[all the Gentiles] who are called by my name,"
says the Lord who does this. (Amos 9:12 RSV)

Then comes this beautiful scene:

"Behold, the days are coming," says the Lord,
"when the plowman shall overtake the reaper
and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed;
the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and all the hills shall flow with it.
I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel,
and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them;
they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine,
and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit.
I will plant them upon their land,
and they shall never again be plucked up
out of the land which I have given them,"
says the Lord your God. (Amos 9:13-15 RSV)

That is a picture, of course, of the millennial days when Israel shall at last be restored to the land, never to be removed again.

Now then, why is God so angry with this people? If cruelty makes him angry, it is because his heart is so set upon kindness toward man. If oppression stirs his wrath, it is because he wants men to live in love and peace. If pain inflicted upon others brings judgment from God, it is because his heart is set upon happiness and the well-being of humanity.

The message of this book is that God is relentless when he begins to deal with man. He will not make peace. He will not compromise. When he begins to deal with a nation, he insists on absolute values. When he begins to deal with an individual, he deals with absolute values. Just the fact that we are Christians does not mean that we escape the condemnation of the judgment of the Word of God in those areas where we are attempting to compromise. Just because we have been Christians for 40 years doesn't change the relentlessness of the Word of God. as it searches and probes our hearts and lives. God doesn't change. He is God…..

The word of this prophet is that we are dealing with a God of righteousness and of unbending, inflexible zeal who will not compromise in any way, and yet, our God is a God of patience and of love. The marvelous undertone of this book, as through all the prophets, is that of the outpouring of the love of God's heart moving toward the well-being and the happiness of humanity, breaking out every now and then, into beautiful forms of expression. Undergirding the whole book is the promise, at last ,to bring Israel -- and all the people of God -- into the day when man shall live in peace and joy and harmony with God the Father, never to face judgment again,,,,,,

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IIII                                                   Obadiah……

(On Saint Patrick’s Day 2013, two people got in a fight in a Boston subway. After a heated argument, a woman gets up and starts brutally punching a man in the face. The other riders on the subway did nothing -- they just sat in their seats and watched. Many of them even recorded the fight on their cell phones and posted them on YouTube.

On April 17th, 2008, six girls got in a fight in Clarksville, Indiana. The girls all ranged in age from 12 to 14. At one point, the fight was 5 on 1, with one girl grabbing rocks from the ground and repeatedly beating the victim in the head. We know this because at least three adults stood by and recorded the fight on their cell phones. None of them tried to stop the fight.

There are countless more examples of this sort of thing happening -- people are getting hurt, sometimes even killed -- and everyone around them simply watch and do nothing. Why? Is it because we like to watch? I don’t know how many times I’ve heard friends of mine laughing about a fight they saw at school, or sharing a video of a fight online. A lot of times they get excited, and start “picking sides” -- even though they don’t know anything about what is happening or why.

This is actually a recognized psychological phenomenon, called the “Bystander Effect”. In short, people are less likely to help if someone is getting hurt if there is a large number of people around them. If they’re by themselves, though, they’re actually more likely to help. It’s something that’s gotten to the point where people who record a violent crime on their phone without trying to help the victim are getting in trouble themselves. Students are getting suspended; adults are going to jail.

This isn’t anything new, though. This has been going on for thousands of years -- not on a recording video on a cell phone, obviously -- but standing by, doing nothing, while other people get hurt. Getting punished for doing this isn’t new either.)

 Let’s go to the book of Obadiah.

Obadiah, the shortest book in the Old Testament, is the pronouncement of doom against an ancient and long-forgotten nation, the land of Edom. But there is more to this book than that. The Scriptures have that beautiful quality, of appearing to be one thing on the surface, but on a deeper level, yielding rich and mighty treasures. That is certainly true of this amazing book of Obadiah.

We know very little about Obadiah except that he was one of the minor prophets.  And most Bible commentators believe the author of this book was a contemporary of the prophet Jeremiah, the last of the prophets before Israel went into captivity.

The name Obadiah means "the servant of Jehovah;" he fulfills the position of a servant. He comes and does his work and fades into the background; he delivers his message and he is gone. And that is about all we know about the man behind this book.

The book of Obadiah tells the story of two nations, the nation of Israel and the nation of Edom, the country to the south of Israel that is now usually referred to as the Negev or Negeb. Through this ancient land of Edom, the Israelites marched as they came into the land of Israel out of the captivity and slavery of Egypt. As they came into the land they had difficulty with the Edomites; they were enemies of Israel from its very beginning.

But behind the story of these two nations, this book tells the story of two men. Every nation in the Bible is a lengthened shadow of its founder, and the two men behind the nations Israel an Edom were twin brothers. Jacob and Esau. Jacob was the father of Israel, and Esau, his twin brother, became the father of the Edomites. In the story of these nations, we also have the extended story of these two men, Jacob and Esau. God, in a sense, has put Jacob and Esau into an enlarger, and blown them up to national size. As the prophet discusses this you can see that the story of these two men continues; Israel is still Jacob and Edom is still Esau.

Jacob and Esau were in perpetual antagonism. We read in the book of Genesis that even before they were born, they struggled together in their mother's womb. That antagonism marked the lives of these two men, and, consequently, the lives of their descendants, the two nations of Israel and Edom.

And as you recall from Genesis, Jacob was his mother's darling and Esau was daddy's little man, and there was one unending conflict between the two of them, which did not end with the lives of these men. 

The nations carried on this same conflict, and all the way from Genesis through Malachi there is the threat of struggle and unbroken antagonism between them. In the book of Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, God says, "I have loved Jacob but I have hated Esau." (Malachi 1:2) Why does the story of these two men come to a focus here in this little prophecy of Obadiah? What is so important about these two men and these two nations? Well, that is what the book of Obadiah makes very clear to us.

 In the New Testament we discover that there is a perpetual antagonism within the nature of the Christian. In Galatians 5:17 we are told that the flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh; they are opposed to one another.

God is a great illustrator. He is always using pictures for us so that we can understand truth more easily, more graphically. We are children in this respect. We like to have a picture. We would rather see something than hear it, so God has many pictures. Ray Stedman says that He has taken these two men and the subsequent nations that came from them and used them through the Bible as a consistent picture of the conflict between the flesh and the spirit -- Jacob and Esau, Israel and Edom.

(This, by the way, is a wonderful key to Bible study. Have you learned to recognize what we might call interpretational constants that run throughout the scriptures? There are certain names and figures, or metaphors and similes that, once used to symbolize a thing, maintain that characteristic and that reference all the way through the Bible, wherever they are used. You know how this is true of certain items, certain material things, like oil. Wherever oil is used symbolically in Scriptures it is a picture of the Holy Spirit. Wine is always a picture of joy in the Scriptures. Leaven is always a picture of evil. These two men, Jacob and Esau, and the nations Israel and Edom, always appear as a picture of a struggle between the flesh and the spirit that is going on in our own lives as believers. Esau lusts against Jacob, and Jacob against Esau; the two great principles are irreconcilably opposed to one another.)

Obadiah turns the spotlight first on Esau, who is the man of the flesh, and Edom, the proud nation that came from the flesh, and he answers the question "Why does God hate Esau?" The trouble with Esau, the prophet says, is this (verse 3):

The pride of your heart has deceived you,
you who live in the clefts of the rock,
whose dwelling is high,
who say in your heart,
"Who will bring me down to the ground?" (Obadiah 1:3 RSV)

The trouble with Esau is pride. Pride is the root of all human evil, and pride is the basic characteristic of what the Bible calls the flesh that lusts against, wars against, the Spirit. The flesh is a principle that stands against God's purposes in human life and continually defies what God is trying to accomplish. Each of us has this struggle within us if we are Christians, and its basic characteristic is revealed here as pride. That is the number one identifying mark of the flesh.

Proverbs 6:16 says: "There are six things which the Lord hates, seven which are an abomination to him." And what is number one on the list? A proud look. And everything else that follows is a variation of pride. Those that are swift to run after mischief, he that spreads lies and slander and discord among brothers -- all these things are manifestations of that single basic evil, pride. This is the satanic nature which was implanted in the human race; all who are born of Adam have this congenital twist of pride, the independent ego that evaluates everything only in terms of its importance or its unimportance to self. The universe centers around self, the rival god. That is pride. That is Esau; that is Edom. It can appear in our lives in ten thousand ways, but you will find some common expressions of it here in this book of Obadiah.

One way it may be expressed is in self-sufficiency (verses 3, 4):

... who say in your heart,
"Who will bring me down to the ground?"
Though you soar aloft like the eagle,
though your nest is set among the stars,
thence I will bring you down, says the Lord. (Obadiah 1:3b-4 RSV)

Here is the man who says, "Nobody can touch me. Who is going to upset me? My plans are all laid out. I am able to carry through what I set out to do." This attitude of self-sufficient ability is a mark of pride. And the Lord says that "though you soar aloft like the eagle, though your nest is set among the stars, yet I am able to bring you down."

The reference in this book to "you who live in the clefts of the rock" is a very literal reference to the nation of Edom. If you have had the privilege of visiting the Holy Land, you may have gone down into the Negev area and visited the city of Petra. This amazing city is approached through a tremendous fissure that runs for a mile or more right through the rock, a narrow file only a few yards wide that brings you at last into an open place where temples have been carved out of the living rock -- giant temples with doorways in them some 25-30 feet high. That was the capital of Edom. That was the ancient city, whose people felt that because of these natural defenses they were impregnable. They lifted up their hearts in pride and, as the Lord speaking through the prophet says, the pride of their heart is deceived; they thought that nothing could overthrow them, but God said it would be done. Just a few years after our Lord's day, the Romans came in and destroyed the cities of Edom and took this impregnable fortress. It has been in ruins ever since.

This kind of self-sufficiency is clearly evident in the man who says, "I don't need God. I can run my own life without God, in my own wisdom, my own strength, my own abilities, my own talents -- that is enough. that is all I need to make a success in life." But self-sufficiency is also seen in the Christian who says, "Well, I need God, yes, in times of danger and fear and pressure, but I am quite able, thank you, to make my own decisions about the girl I am going to marry, or the career I am going to follow, or the friends that I have, or the car that I buy or anything else like that." That is the same spirit of self sufficiency, isn't it?

The thing that characterized the Lord Jesus Christ and marked him as continually opposed to this spirit of self-sufficiency was his utter dependence on the Father. 

We Christians have to learn that if there is any area of our life where we think that we've got what it takes to do without God, it is in that same area that we are manifesting the flesh, the pride of Edom. When believers step into their office, or the playground, or the neighborhood or to their volunteer efforts or errand running, on Monday morning and have been fine Christians on Sunday and all through the weekend, but on Monday morning they say, "Now I am in charge. I know what to do here. I don't need the Bible. I don't need God. I don't need my religion to help me here. I know exactly how to run this business," you are manifesting this same spirit of Edom, this spirit of self-sufficiency. In many areas of their lives Christians live as though God were dead, they believe in God, but live as though he were dead, they live without any sense of dependency upon his wisdom and his strength.

Another form of pride is found in this little book, too (verse 10):

For the violence done to your brother Jacob,
shame shall cover you,
and you shall be cut off for ever. (Obadiah 1:10 RSV)

Violence is a form of pride; the man who strikes his wife, a child who has been beaten, a baby whose bones have been broken, and who has been damaged internally. What is behind this violence of the human heart? An unbroken ego, a spoiled and cowardly spirit. Pride is centered only on self and it strikes out against anything that dares to challenge its supreme reign in life. Even in Christian homes, there are woman with black eyes and bruises on their legs and arms because their Christian husbands, who is a Sunday School teacher, has beaten her. Where does this violence come from? It is from Edom. It is the pride of the flesh.

Here is another form of pride (verse 11):

On the day that you stood aloof,
on the day that strangers carried off his wealth,
and foreigners entered his gates
and cast lots for Jerusalem,
you were like one of them. (Obadiah 1:11 RSV)[You just stood and watched.]

Indifference is a form of pride. I think this is by far one of the major causes of marital difficulty. In the constant stream of people who have come to see me about problems in their marriage, almost invariably, somewhere along the line, I hear the complaint. "Well, he is simply indifferent to me. He doesn't care about me. He ignores me." Or, "She pays no attention to me. She isn't interested in the things that I am interested in." Isn't it strange that these things can be true in Christian homes? And how quickly it comes in after courtship. During the courtship it is, "What are you thinking about? Tell me what you would like?" But when marriage comes, it is, "Where's dinner? Where is the paper? What's on TV?" And the concern is entirely different. Why? Well, Esau is at work -- that's why. The force in human life that God hates is Esau.

There is yet another form of pride that we read about in Obadiah (verses 12,13):

But you should not have gloated over the day of your brother
in the day of his misfortune;
you should not have rejoiced over the people of Judah
in the day of their ruin;
you should not have boasted
in the day of distress.
You should not have entered the gate of my people
in the day of his calamity;
you should not have gloated over his disaster
in the day of his calamity;
you should not have looted his goods
in the day of his calamity. (Obadiah 1:12-13 RSV)

God charges Edom with the sin of gloating as a manifestation of this basic problem of pride. Notice how you hear this so frequently in children who haven't yet learned to cover up what they feel with a subtle varnish of politeness: "Yay, yah, yah, good for you. You had it coming!" Did you ever say that in your own heart about somebody? "You had it coming." You were gloating over them. Adults learn to disguise this sometimes, but it comes out once in a while. You hear that the boss is sick, and you say. "Nothing trivial, I hope." What do you say when someone fails and you hear about it? Do you ever say, "Well, I told you so. I knew that would happen. I expected it all along"? That is the sense of gloating, you see. I remember reading of the hypochondriac who had written on his tombstone the words, "I told you I was sick."

Now, what causes this? Why do we like to rub salt on another's wounds? What is behind this perverse delight we take in another person's failure or his faults? It is Esau in us. The flesh lusts against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. In our pride and unconcern we don't care what happens to someone else, as long as everything is all right with us.

Another manifestation of pride is exploitation (verse 14):

You should not have stood at the parting of the ways
to cut off his fugitives;
you should not have delivered up his survivors
in the day of distress. (Obadiah 1:14 RSV)

When calamity fell, Edom took advantage of it. The Edomites moved in on a fallen people, a captured people, took advantage of the fact that these were fugitives, and used their trouble and their misery to their own advantage. They delivered up the survivors in the day of Israel's distress. They took unfair advantage. God hates it when we utilize another's weakness or bad luck to our advantage.

Have you ever heard anyone say, "Well, I had a contractor bid on some work I would like him to do, and the fellow made a mistake and he has underbid this. But I am going to hold him to It. After all, I've got the contract. He signed it and I am going to hold him to it"? That is taking advantage of another's mistake. We find this spirit coming up so easily when something like that happens. We say, "Oh, that is your hard luck. Finders keepers, losers weepers." We try to move in and take advantage of another's distress.

"Oh," you say, "I could never do a thing like that." Well, how many of you are on the lookout for some old coin, or some antique chair, or some widow selling her husband's golf clubs who doesn't know the value of them? What a bargain! Move in on that and take advantage of it.

Well, this is only a partial listing of the ways of Esau, the man God hates, but the worse thing, the tragedy of Esau, is back in verse 3, where God says,

The pride of your heart has deceived you. (Obadiah 1:3 RSV)

You are this way, but you don't know it. Blind to your own problems, you go on thinking that everything is fine, but suddenly everything falls to pieces, just as it did here to Edom (verses 6, 7):

How Esau has been pillaged,
his treasures sought out!
All your allies have deceived you,
they have driven you to the border;
your confederates have prevailed against you;
your trusted friends have set a trap under you --
there is no understanding of it. (Obadiah 1:6-7 RSV)

That is the terrible thing about pride. It traps us. It tricks us. It trips us up. We don't recognize it until we are too late. We go stumbling along in our pride and arrogance and vanity and we think we are doing fine. Everyone else can see the trouble we are having, but we go blissfully on, sawing away on the limb, totally unaware that the limb we are sawing on is the limb we are sitting on, until it falls down and we are suddenly exposed.

Remember the story of The Emperor's New Clothes? The emperor advertised throughout his kingdom for a tailor to make him an especially good suit, and a man came and told him he would make him the finest suit that had ever been made. He brought a piece of cloth and showed it to the emperor, only the trouble was, there was nothing there. He held up his hands as though holding a piece of cloth, and he said to the emperor, "You know, this cloth has a really remarkable quality. Only the pure in heart can see it. If you have an evil in your heart, you can't see this cloth, but if your heart is pure, then you can see it. Now, surely, sir, you can see it?" The emperor couldn't see anything, but he nodded his head and said, "What beautiful cloth! What remarkable cloth. That is exactly what I am looking for." And so the man made him a suit from this cloth and he came and put it on him and the poor emperor stood there naked, fancying he had these clothes on. He called his courtiers in to admire him (of course he told them of the special quality of the cloth) and they too said, "Oh my, what a beautiful suit!"

No one would admit that he couldn't see a thing until the emperor, in his pride and his vanity, decided to go out to the public streets of the city so everyone could see him. There goes the poor ignorant fellow, strutting along in his nakedness, and the whole city out there admiring him -- all but a little boy who stood up and said, "But the emperor doesn't have anything on."

Now what can you do about this? This is where we live, isn't it? We all have this problem of the flesh within. Well, that is not the end of the story (verses 15,16):

For the day of the Lord is near upon all the nations.
As you have done, it shall be done to you,
your deeds shall return on your own head.
For as you have drunk upon my holy mountain,
all the nations round about shall drink;
they shall drink, and stagger,
and shall be as though they had not been. (Obadiah 1:15-16 RSV)

In other words, God has determined judgment upon Edom, and there is no escaping it. Does that sound like destruction? Well, it is -- for Esau. There is no hope for Esau; there is no way out. The judgment of God is absolutely inescapable for Esau. God is forever set against him. 

One of the grandsons of Esau was a man named Amalek, who withstood the Israelites on their way into Canaan. In Exodus 17:14-16 it is recorded that God said to Moses, "I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven." And Moses says, "The Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation." That is what God is saying about the flesh. He will never make peace with it.

But the day of triumph is for Jacob (verses 17, 18):

But in Mount Zion there shall be those that escape
[Mount Zion is Jerusalem, or Jacob],
and it shall be holy;
and the house of Jacob shall possess their own possessions.
The house of Jacob shall be a fire,
and the house of Joseph a flame,
and the house of Esau stubble;
they shall burn them and consume them,
and there shall be no survivor to the house of Esau;
for the LORD has spoken. (Obadiah 1:17-18 RSV)

And finally (verse 21):

Saviors shall go up to Mount Zion to rule Mount Esau;
and the kingdom shall be the Lord's. (Obadiah 1:21 RSV)

This is what you might call the ruthlessness of God. He has his heart set to destroy Esau. After all, that is the whole story of the coming of the Holy Spirit into the human heart; he has come to destroy Esau and all these characteristics of the flesh. He will destroy them in those who are his and bring Jacob into the full inheritance of all his possessions -- and the weapon he uses is the judgment of the cross.

Isn't it interesting that when you get to the New Testament you find these same two principles personified again in two persons who meet in the pages of the Gospels face to face. In the last week of our Lord's sufferings, he stands before Herod. Herod, we are told, is an Idumean, which is another spelling of Edom -- he is an Edomite. Jesus before Herod -- the representative of Jacob and the representative of Esau face to face. Herod the Edomite, proud, arrogant and rebellious, watches the cruel mockery of the soldiers as they strip the Lord down and dress him in his royal robes. The Gospel writer says that Herod plied him with many questions, but for the son of Esau there is no answer from the son of Jacob. He has nothing to discuss with him. There can be no compromise. God has nothing to say to the flesh, nothing at all except judgment.

And what is the final issue of that account? The prisoner went out to a cross and a grave, and from it he emerged a king; but King Herod went on to disgrace, exile, and, finally, to a grave in a foreign country. Beyond that he is a prisoner, bound by chains of his own making, eternally.

Now which are we? kings or prisoners? Is Esau or Jacob ruling??

We need the Father, to search our hearts in this moment, as we see how vividly this Old Testament illustration sets before us the truth of the New Testament. As we stand face to face with the mirror of His Word, we can see ourselves. May we not be as those James describes, who look in the mirror and see themselves and then go on their way and promptly forget what they see. May God grant to us the grace to yield ourselves to Him, in every aspect of our lives….so that we can never be caught with the pride of Esau in our hearts.