Bite 12: Summary and Application of Amos 2:4-3:2

Quick Summary

When studying, you know I have the tendency to get absorbed with the details. The exercise of pulling back, leaving details out, letting my focus glaze a bit in order to only see the big picture, this is good and right. That is my first order of business this morning.

Outline of Summary

I made another attempt at a sort of line item summary, trying to incorporate that correlation.

Summary Composition

Sometimes attempts need to be discarded. Like this attempt at a summary.

In my next effort, I was considering the whole of the book that I’ve studied so far. Even while writing a summary of the passage, I want to remember the whole forest and not just the trees among which I’m standing.

Now I will continue on to making application from this passage to my own life.

God is Faithful

If we think about the history of the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, what have they seen? What have their campfire stories been about? Scan through Genesis and Exodus; these are their first cultural and national stories. Let’s list just a few.

• Creation
• Flood
• Fulfillment of promise to Abram of an offspring
• Joseph’s slavery and deliverance of his people
• The Exodus

With their oral tradition, what have the children of Israel heard Yahweh do?

• God made everything by the power of his Word.
• There was a warning from God that because of the corruption and violence on the earth, he was going to flood and kill everything that wasn’t in the ark. Then he did it.
• God promised a child to a next-to-dead guy through his equally next-to-dead wife and Isaac was born.
• When a famine occurred in Canaan, Joseph was in power in Egypt to provide for Israel. All 70 of them.
• The story that topped all stories was the deliverance out of Egypt and out of slavery. God led them right through the Red Sea.

That last one is the story that is told by God himself repeatedly throughout scripture as evidence of what a good God he is. And what a powerful, truth-telling God. He said it; he did it. Every time he says it, he does it.

Giving of the Law

In the law, God clearly warns in various ways, “If you turn against me, I will turn against you.” Even with all the stories Grandpa could tell, the Hebrews in Amos’s day doubt God will follow through. I want to remember this is the point of history I am at when studying Amos.

Now that I’ve observed this passage, done some interpreting, and distilled a summary, I will see what application and implication there are for my life here.

Not Allegory

Before I share with you questions I asked myself with regard to this passage, let me make it clear that I am not a student who allegorizes the Word. The biblical record is of actual events where the author declares they happened and they are not spiritual stories designed to teach or impart lessons in some way. For example, there were literally descendants of Canaan called Amorites who God cleared out in order to give the land to Israel. You’ll see why this is an important distinction in a moment.

That being said, I do believe that God behaves in patterns. Because he is his nature, he does what he is. If he clears out Amorites in one instance, he also clears out other stuff in other instances. He is a clear-er of stuff. If he punishes sin in one instance, he always punishes sin. One way or the other. He is just.

It’s an interesting exercise to consider this about God and I will let you run through History of Scripture to think of some yourself. My point is that God is consistent. God’s intentions are his accomplishments. He is his character. These all fall short of what I’m trying to say.

Modern Application

Looking over the whole passage, I’m asking questions relating to myself. Not because I am part of Amos’s immediate audience, but because I am part of Amos’s extended audience. That’s why I have to puzzle over what he means by the words he uses: he wasn’t talking directly to me.

And yet God is talking to me through his Word so I will bring the truth forward through time. I want to be vibrantly clear: I am not changing the meaning or intent of the text. I’m not contextualizing. But, for example, I’m also not a student of the Word who is under the same Law the original audience is under. Was under. Because if they were here, they would have opportunity to be under the same law I am.

At this point in time, the law I’m under is different than the Law Amos’s friends and relations were under. But the principle is the same. God is the same. As a child of God, I have laws under which I reside. For my good and God’s glory. The freedom I have is in the law of liberty.

I’m getting so far ahead of myself. We’re dying a death by a thousand qualifications. I’ll get on with it. This is what I’m getting out of my study so far.

Questions

Here are some questions I’m asking the text with my own life in Christ in mind.

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These stickies are my preliminary thoughts. For example, as I consider the second sticky, I don’t actually know if God has destroyed any metaphorical Amorites for me. Yet. Please observe though that I’m noticing there is a possibility that he has. If he has, what have I done about it? Actually, since I am grafted into God’s family, he literally removed the actual Amorites and had my family move in. I think application affords these inquiries and musings.

Also, “mismanaged” on that second sticky annoys me. What a stupid woke way to say that. I need to call it what it is. Corrupted. Polluted. But we are on this path of learning together. Polished study is not my goal. Boots on the ground, real-time study is what I want you to see. Study is not necessarily organized, safe, sterile.

Sometimes it’s wrong and I get to go back and recalibrate my thinking to line up with God’s thoughts. I’ve heard it attributed to Johann Kepler that he said he wants to think God’s thoughts after him. I agree with that sentiment. This is where we get to do that together.

Law

This is an important question: What is the law of the LORD now? In Christ, the Law was fulfilled. That means we who are in Christ are free from the Law, right? What a question. Debate rages in the Church for hundreds of years and I think I could settle here and now in our little coffee time together as I discuss with you about what I’m learning? Ha. Well, I won’t settle it for the Church, but I will get to a better place of understanding for myself. That’s all I’m responsible for right now.

OT Law and NT Law

I’m not planning to launch into a big study of what the law is in the NT right now, but I want to remember truth about our God: he is good and what he has declared is good. The Law of the OT is good. Just because I’m no longer under OT Law doesn’t make it bad. I tried to come up with a good word to describe the status of the OT Law. Obsolete? That sounds negative. Out-of-date? But it’s actually still in effect. Jeremy suggested superannuated. While that is amusing to consider, the Law isn’t technological and it’s still not out-of-date. It hasn’t even been amended.

Can you see my difficulty? All of the law, whether in the OT or the NT, they are both of God. Jesus didn’t come along and say, “Hey Dad, your law is too hard. I’ll come up with something else.” And then give us this softer, smoother law. The trinity is in unity about the law in all of its forms, types, conditions, usages. The Law was good and the law is good.

Why are there different laws for the believer now? Because that good OT Law was completed, finished, fulfilled. And going back to it? That’s like saying what Jesus did in his life, death, and resurrection wasn’t enough.

That would be blasphemy.

My effort to explain the connection between the Old and the New falls short. I would like to know what words the Old Dead Guys use to explain this. But I haven’t gotten that far in my learning. Please understand this explanation is flawed, but know that all of the Law is good.

NT Law

So I looked around in the NT to see what is the “law” for me as a believer now? In order to see how the law for the NT believer is discussed, I used the search bar in Logos with the phrase “law of.” These are the hits that came up. I jotted them on stickies.

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Succinctly, how is the law I’m under described in the NT? I distilled a list.

• The law of faith from Romans 3:27
• The law of the Spirit of life from Romans 8:2
• Law of Christ from 1 Corinthians 9:21
• The perfect law, law of liberty from James 1:25

Side Note

Funny, the phrase law of faith can be applied to OT Law as well. If you look at Romans 3:27-31, the circumcised are justified by faith (OT) and the uncircumcised are justified through faith (NT). See? The OT and the NT are inextricably tied together. No one should dismiss or ignore the OT based on the idea “I’m not under that anymore.” We are under it, but under under that is the law that the NT speaks of. If we don’t have a clue about the OT Law, how can we actually understand the law we are under now?

The Law for Me

I can see that I need to investigate further into the study of the law. All of the law. How does it apply right now? There are verses like Romans 8:2 where the law of the Spirit of life has set me free from the law of sin and death. That’s done in Christ. I understand the words, but I want to have all the dots connected Old to New. Maybe Romans is next in the line-up of books to study. I studied Romans within the last 5 years, but it was more overview. Now I have one of those focuses I was talking about the last couple of times we met. What do I need to know about the law?

But I’m distracted from what Amos is saying. I can make a general application about the law without completely understanding it. Because God’s indictment through Amos is that the children of Israel rejected the Law of the Lord, which they knew. What they knew of God, they disregarded. They went their own way.

The Hebrews were accountable for what they knew. God will not revoke his punishment because they knew and they rejected.

An Aspect of the Law I Know

What do I know of the law I’m under? I know that John recorded Jesus saying this:

A new commandment I give to you, 
that you love one another: 
just as I have loved you, 
you also are to love one another.1

That’s both straightforward and complicated. Especially when I consider Paul’s words:

Bear one another’s burdens, 
and so fulfill the law of Christ.2

Love One Another

A commandment I’m given? That we love one another. There are also a thousand qualifications there about what that means (is it active or emotive? what is being nice and what is enabling?), and exploring those are also for another day. I know what it feels like to be loved and I know what it feels like to not be loved. For me, starting there is good enough for now.

Thinking about the passage, loving one another is encapsulating all Amos’s audience rejected. Devaluing humans by selling them for silver and sandals? Trampling head of poor into the dust? Keeping garments given in pledge into the night? Excessive taxation? None of these have anything to do with loving one another; rather quite the opposite.

This direction of application dovetails with a book I’m reading right now by Dr. Sproul called The Hunger for Significance. There is a basic thread that our significance is important because we are made in the image of God. Even though I don’t know exactly what it means to be made in his image, it is truth. And there are implications for my life because it is true. Both for my own self and for how I interact with fellow humans.

My application in light of the law I am under? I will value people. In whatever way I can, I will honor my fellow man. Currently, that means that I sell people quality pots out of my Etsy store, created to be a force of beauty where there wasn’t any before. When I pass people on the street, I will look them in the eye and engage with them to the level they are willing to engage. No matter who they are. If you read Sproul’s book that I linked up there, when you get to the section where he talks about the different ways some nurses treat doctors and the way they treat the housekeeping staff, you’ll understand why this has come to my attention.

Side Note

Remember, these are applications for me. If I lived in NYC and I made eye contact with everyone, that could mean that I get beat up every day. Maybe not the best option. But I live in a small mountain town where I can live anonymously (in recent months this is my norm) or I can engage passersby. See how application and implication needs to be personal? Individual?

Gifts

I already gone on a bit about what’s rattling around in my head. But I want to address this other thought before we go our separate ways today. Because this has been a difficult process, personally.

When someone is a prophet or dedicated to the Lord, if they are minimized from the outside or from within, does that change anything? Is it any less a trampling of a gift from God depending on the source of the trample?

Hypostatic Union

Over the course of my life in Christ, I have had the ability to study the Word and then notice discrepancies. For example, I’ve fellowshipped at a church where I heard the pastor say in the preparation of communion that “God died for our sins.”

No, he didn’t. God is eternally the same. God did not die. Nietzsche was wrong! This is why the savior had to come as the God-man. He had to be God to endure and man to die. Understand the hypostatic union fully? Hah. But I don’t have to in order to know that God cannot die. If God ceased to be God in any aspect, everything else would cease to be.

My Response

But did I go talk to the pastor? Nope. When asked by a fellow sheep after church how I liked the service, I told him passionately that I didn’t like the part where the heresy was spoken. Misguided passion. Why didn’t I keep my mouth shut to the other sheep? Well, actually I can answer that because I honestly thought that person was my friend. He was very definitely not. Mad he got.

Which is not the point. I trampled on the gift God gave me of knowing truth but not doing anything about it. Nothing useful. If I were visiting a church, I wouldn’t necessarily go talk to the pastor. But this had been a church I regularly attended. The right use of the gift would have been to go discourse with the source. I never did and I still regret that.

Significance to me? This is going to be specific because God raising up prophets and then the people (even if it’s the prophet) commanding the prophet, “You shall not prophesy” hit me between the eyes. Between my eyes. Remember, implication is personal.

If I’m attending a church regularly and I hear the pastor speak a violation of the Word, I will go directly to him and dialogue with him concerning that issue.

Because I’m sharing a very personal thing with you, I will clarify that I’m not saying I will go stir the pot for any and every thing on which I might disagree. I’ve heard Sproul describe God as whispering on some subjects. If God whispers, I will follow his lead.

God’s character and nature are not whispered. Miles of papyrus have been spent on the topic.

Wrap Up

A Bible Study Bite to consider today? I keep bringing it up. Application, implication, significance are personal. Do due diligence as can be done with the text first, and then make application for yourself. Be aware of the first audience and that particularly in the OT, we are not among them. However, a part of the extended audience? Yup. That we are.

So gather the intended message from the author. Listen as the original audience would have heard it. Observe and interpret and recognize the implications presented. From what has been given, decide how you as the student of the Word will respond.

Thanks for studying with me today! If you’ve found anything helpful here, please like and subscribe. And if you know of other students of the Word, would you please share so we can all study and encourage each other with what we’re learning?

1. John 13:34 (ESV)
2. Galatians 6:2 (ESV)