Funeral for a Dead Nation

Transcription of the eighth episode of Studies in the Book of Amos brought to you by Pastor Rusty Tardo.

You can listen here.

“We're studying the book of Amos on Wednesday nights.

This book could be subtitled Amos' Prophecies to America, because they are so relevant.

We saw last week when we studied chapter 4 that Amos was not known for his diplomacy, especially when he addressed the rich, wealthy women of ease in Samaria. You remember verse 1, how he addressed them.

We want to look at chapter 5 tonight. Now, I've titled this chapter Funeral for a Dead Nation.

Funeral for a Dead Nation.

Father, open our eyes tonight, we pray.

Help us to see, to learn, to understand, to apply what we learn to our lives, and most importantly, to be further conformed to the image and example of our Savior Jesus Christ. We want to glorify You, Lord, with our lives, our words, our actions, even our thoughts.

So Father, use this message tonight to produce that end in us, we pray.

In Jesus' name.

Amen. Funeral for a Dead Nation.

“Chapter 5 actually begins with the same words, the same phrase as chapter 3 and chapter 4.

Notice this introductory phrase to this chapter.

Hear ye this word.

It's the same thing he said at the beginning of chapter 4.

Hear this word.

Same thing he said chapter 3.

Hear this word.

Well, in chapter 3, he addressed the children of Israel or the sons of Israel. In chapter 4, he addressed the cows of Samaria, actually the women of ease in Israel. Here in chapter 5, he addresses the whole house of Israel.

Hear ye this word which I take up against you, even a lamentation, O house of Israel.

So he's addressing the whole family of God, that is the whole northern kingdom there in Israel, to all of the inhabitants of the northern kingdom.

Now notice, he calls them to hear the Word.

Chapter 3, hear the Word.

Chapter 4, hear this Word.

Chapter 5, hear this Word.

You know, that's always God's emphasis, Old Testament and New, hearing the Word, the Word of God.

The Word of God is what revolutionizes our lives.

It's hearing the Word of God that produces faith in our hearts.

Faith comes by hearing, doesn't it?

How shall they be saved except they hear, except the preacher go and preach the Word? And people hear it, and then what they hear produces faith in their heart. They repent of sin.

They receive Christ.

It's the Word of God that transforms lives.

You are here tonight because you heard the Word, because you paid attention to what you heard, because you allowed it to have place in your heart, and it transformed your lives.

It's the Word of God that's produced fruit and maturity and growth and wisdom and knowledge and all of those things in our lives because we've given our attention to the Word of God.

Well, here he calls his people to hear this word.

But notice this in verse 1.

This isn't just a word to Israel.

It's a word against Israel. He says, hear this word which I take up against you, O house of Israel.

And what word is that?

Well, the very end of verse 1 says it's a lamentation or a dirge.

You've heard of a funeral dirge?

An old melancholy dirge.

A funeral song?

Well, that's what this is.

It's a funeral song.

It's a funeral dirge.

Now, I've divided chapter 5 into four parts, and I want to give you these four sections tonight.

I've subtitled each one of them.

The first one I've subtitled A Lamentation for Israel. That's verses 1 through 3. A Lamentation for Israel.

Now, let's read those three verses. Hear ye this word which I take up against you, even a lamentation, O house of Israel. The virgin of Israel is fallen.

She shall no more rise. She is forsaken upon her land.

There is none to raise her up.

For thus saith the Lord God, the city that went out by a thousand shall leave in hundred, and that which went forth by a hundred shall leave ten to the house of Israel. Now, this is a funeral dirge, a funeral song. In Israel, these dirges were actually sung or chanted by hired mourners.

Mourning, crying, wailing over the dead wasn't always something spontaneous or something felt from the heart in Israel. In order to ensure that there were always enough people there crying and moaning and wailing anyone's death at a funeral service, they hired mourners.

They were professional mourners who actually hired themselves out.

They would go to your relative's funeral and cry many, many tears and wail and moan and make a big public show and throw ashes on their heads and roll in the dirt. And they made sure that this person who died was properly mourned and that their death was grieved over. Even though that grief didn't come from the heart, you see, it was because they were professional mourners, these folks.

But it gives you, again, a little bit of a glimpse of the emphasis that Israel had on outward appearances. To them, the external was everything. That was true not only in their funeral services, making sure that there was enough grief there.

So they hired mourners, but even in their religion itself, everything was external. All the emphasis was on appearances.

The way someone sounded when they spoke, or the length and solemnity of their prayers, the public display of their tithing and giving and almsgiving and so forth.

Externals was everything.

The way they dressed, the way they appeared, the phylacteries and so on.

Externals was the emphasis.

Internals didn't mean a whole lot.

And you see that even as you go further down in this chapter, when God says, I hate all of your external religion, it's got no heart to it.

And that scene even in the fact that that was the emphasis even in their funeral services.

But now, here's something that's really, I guess, a bit unusual about this particular funeral dirge that Amos takes up for Israel.

What's really unusual about it?

Well, listen to this.

Now, it's a dirge for Israel.

What's unusual?

Israel's not dead yet.

They're having the funeral before the death.

It's sort of like having a funeral for somebody who's still alive.

Hello.

Don't you think that's a little bit unusual?

Blowing taps over somebody that's still alive? And, in fact, as far as all outward appearances, rather healthy.

Because at this point in time, remember, in her history, Israel was doing well. They were prospering.

The nation was flourishing.

Their armies were strong.

They weren't being harassed by any immediate enemies.

Their economy was healthy. The rich, especially, were flourishing.

So they were healthy, a healthy patient.

And yet, here's Amos holding a funeral for them, holding a funeral for the nation. Well, he says in verse 2, the virgin of Israel is fallen. The point is, she's as good as dead.

Israel is as good as dead.

The virgin is fallen.

The pure woman has become a fallen woman.

Now, I think that we're to understand this to be true in two senses. First of all, the nation itself is fallen. Fallen from its preeminence, its position.

Fallen as a nation.

It's going to fall and exist no more because some 30 years afterwards, Assyria would invade and carry off the Northern Kingdom.

There would be no more Northern Kingdom.

Just like Amos says here, not only is the pure woman become a fallen woman, but she will no more rise.

She will not get up.

Israel never became a nation again. Not the Northern Kingdom. It never rose to that status again.

This spelled the end.

When this prophecy took place, when it was actually fulfilled, it spelled the end of the Northern Kingdom.

There was no more Northern Kingdom after this.

But this falling also refers to something else. Not just the fact that the nation was going to fall into Assyrian captivity and no longer exist, but it speaks, of course, of Israel falling morally, falling spiritually, falling ethically, because Amos continues to reiterate his emphasis. Continuously, he keeps coming back, saying, judgment doesn't exist in your nation anymore.

You oppress the poor.

You rob and cheat the poor, the fatherless, the widows, and so forth, so that the fat get fatter, the rich get richer, the poor get poorer. There is no justice in the gates.

The court system is corrupted. The judges are all bribed.

The rich are never arrested for wrongdoing. The poor, in the meanwhile, are being beaten down and oppressed. So he always harps not only on its moral sins because they had fallen morally as well, but on its social evils, its perversion of justice and so on.

He says, and this is pretty strong language here in verse 2, She shall no more rise. Never again will Israel rise to its former posture. When you get the whole picture here that he's holding a funeral for a prospering nation, it almost would make Amos seem like he was a little bit ridiculous, don't you think?

If someone stood out on the steps of the city hall in New Orleans and brought in a coffin and started blowing taps and starts prophesying, saying, I'm having your funeral service, oh America. And America's riding high.

You know, we just whipped our enemies real good over in the Gulf War, and the economy's struggling a bit, but everyone's confident it'll rebound.

But suppose someone just stood out there and started saying, and I'm holding America's funeral service because America, you're dead, you're finished, you're going to fall, you'll never rise again as a nation.

Everybody would think somebody needs to take this guy off.

The men with the white coats need to come get him and carry him off.

Well, that's probably about the way they thought about Amos.

He's holding a funeral for a prospering nation.

But in God's eyes, Israel was already dead. Israel was already being lamented. Her death was already certain.

She had continued for so long in rebellion, in defiance, refusing to heed all of the calls God had given her to repentance.

For so long, she had resisted.

There finally came a place where God told his prophet. I mean, if we were to put it in modern language, we would say, blow taps over it.

It's dead. It's finished.

It's a dead nation.

Blow taps over the country.

Verse 3, For thus saith the Lord God.

Now, here it comes. Here's Amos' mantel of prophecy falling upon him. He says, Thus saith the Lord, The city that went out by a thousand shall leave a hundred, and that which went forth by a hundred shall leave ten to the house of Israel.

Your nation will be reduced by nine-tenths.

That's what he's saying.

Nine out of ten will be gone. Will be taken.

Nine out of ten will be destroyed.

Now, I see this passage two ways.

I see it as a prediction of wrath.

But you know what else I see here? Mercy.

Mercy.

Wrath upon a deserving nation.

Now, they were wicked.

They were rebellious.

They were defiant.

They were idolatrous.

They were immoral. And in spite of the fact that they were a privileged nation, remember, we've dealt with this in previous studies, just how privileged they were.

And if we were to compare ourselves with Israel, we would have to admit America likewise is a privileged nation.

In fact, more privileged even than Israel was, and probably more wicked than Israel was, unfortunately.

But here's the wrath. Nine tenths are going to be destroyed, are going to be taken.

The city that once had a thousand that went out, it's now going to have a hundred.

Nine-tenths will be gone.

The city that once had a hundred go out, will now just have ten to go out.

The rest will be destroyed. But also see it as mercy.

Mercy in that all are not destroyed. Mercy in that a remnant is left.

That is mercy.

Because in His mercy, He left the remnant.

In His mercy, not all perished.

In His mercy, a tenth were preserved.

Now, you can see in this passage, you can see election.

You can actually see election here.

That all deserve to be destroyed because all have sinned.

All deserve death.

But mercy spares a remnant. That's what election is.

It's mercy that spares a remnant. I like what one old Tomer would say.

He would say, wrath smites many, but mercy spares a remnant.

That's exactly right.

Wrath smites many, but mercy spares a remnant.

So the first section in this chapter, we've called the Lamentation for Israel, verses 1-3. The second section I've called Seeking the Right Things.

That's verses 4-17.

Seeking the Right Things.

Verse 4.

Let's see here, first of all, that there is life, there's joy, there's blessedness in seeking the Lord.

For thus saith the Lord...

Let me just point something out while I'm right here.

You notice in verse 3, he said, For thus saith the Lord.

You see that at the beginning of verse 3?

Verse 4, For thus saith the Lord.

He says it again.

But I want you to notice the difference in the two words, Lord. Notice in verse 3, capital L, but then small o-r-d. In verse 4, rather, there's Lord, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D.

There's a reason for that.

Any time you see all the letters capitalized, that's the Hebrew tetragrammaton.

That's the Hebrew Yahweh, the covenant name of God, Yahweh.

Whenever you see capital L, but the small letters, Lord, it's Adonai.

Now, there's a significance to that, and we'll get to it in just a minute.

For thus saith the Lord, thus saith Yahweh, unto the house of Israel, seek ye me, and you will live.

Seek me and live.

The word seek means to search after, to study after, to apply yourself, to follow after. In Judaism, it was the same word used to refer to seeking after the words of the law, the holy books, the Bible, and so forth. Amos is telling Israel to seek God in truth by returning to the Word of God, returning to the right way of God, seeking the truth of God, the presence of God, worshiping Him, and you'll live.

He said if you'll seek God the right way, you'll live.

Go back to the Word and you'll live.

You see, they had departed from the Word.

Here they were in the northern kingdom worshiping calves.

Involved with idolatry and false worship and religious practices, he's saying if you'll go back to seeking God the right way, the simple right Word, you'll live.

You'll have life.

Otherwise, he says you'll have destruction.

Verse 5, he says there is barrenness. There is bondage and emptiness in seeking the wrong things. But seek not Bethel, nor enter into Gilgal, and pass not to Beersheba, for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to nothing.

So these cities that he mentions here were religious centers. They were the places that were traveled to by Israel and sought out by the Israelites. They went there to make their vows and to pay their tithes and offer up their sacrifices.

They went there to worship.

They went there to sing. They went there to pray and dance and do all the things religious people do.

Keep in mind, Israel was still religious. They were religious people.

But they weren't seeking the Lord.

They weren't seeking the right way.

You see, it's not enough to be religious.

You have to be right.

There's a lot of people who are religious, but they're not right.

Those who, our soldiers just came out of the Middle East, the Islamic people are very religious.

They pray five times a day. They kneel on their prayer rugs. They face towards Mecca, and they make their prayers.

They're very religious people, but they're not right.

The Hindus are religious people.

Somebody was just telling me the other day how they were watching some folks, these Hindus, who were bowing in front of a tree.

And it looked like they were worshiping the tree.

Well, Hindus worship thousands and millions of gods. And one of the things that they practice is, like Shintos and some other religions, they have spirit houses.

They actually believe their ancestors inhabit things like this, and they'll burn incense in these little spirit houses placed in trees.

They'll worship in front of them.

And you find some of these religions are actually pantheistics.

They see God in everything.

They pray to a tree. They'll pray to a rock. They'll pray to a river.

They'll pray to the moon.

They'll pray to the sun, the wind.

These people are religious.

They pray, but they're not right.

And then you find people who dedicate themselves and are extremely religious.

Some of you grew up in Catholicism.

Some of you were very religious in Catholicism.

Some of you attended Mass regularly.

Some Catholics go every single day, and yet are lost.

They're as lost as can be.

Lost as a ball in high weeds.

Lost, as one fellow said, lost as a goose in a fog.

But they're religious.

They're not right, but they're religious.

If you've ever been around a zealous Jehovah witness, you won't find people more zealous, more religious, but they're not right.

Unfortunately, there's a lot of people even in churches, Christian churches, who are religious. They go through a lot of religious motions. They attend church regularly.

They carry a Bible.

They pray.

But they're not right. They're not right with God.

Their hearts aren't right.

They're far from God, and their religion isn't anything more than Israel's religion was. It was an external thing, a ceremony, a rite, a ritual.

They went there out of obligation.

They thought they fulfilled their sense of duty.

But when they walked out the door, they thought they were just as wicked and reprobate as they were before they walked in.

They still lie, cheat, steal, try to rob their neighbor, customers, whatever. They're dishonest. They're uncouth.

They're profane.

They're drunkards. They're immoral.

They're religious, though, but they're not right.

That's the way it was with Israel.

And God despises external religion.

That's something else that we see emphasized right here in this very chapter.

Israel's religion was false. Their religion was corrupt.

They would go to Beersheba.

They would go to Gilgal.

They would go to Bethel. They'd pay their tithes.

They'd make their offerings.

They'd sing their songs and so forth.

But their religion never condemned their sin, their greed, their immorality.

It never pierced their conscience.

It never pricked their hearts.

It never convicted them of anything.

It was corrupt.

Verse 6, notice this.

Amos repeats the call to seek God.

Seek the Lord, and you shall live, lest He break out like fire in the house of Joseph.

And devour it, and there will be none to quench it in Bethel.

Instead of seeking the calves, instead of seeking to go to Bethel and Gilgal, seek the Lord.

Put your emphasis there.

Seek God.

Seek Him personally.

Seek to know Him.

Have a relationship with Him. To serve Him.

To worship Him.

And then the fire of destruction that is certainly going to fall on others, that fire will spare you.

Now, if you remember when we first started this series, I said that Amos was a prophet of doom.

You remember that?

Well, Amos certainly is a prophet of doom because his messages are constantly judgment, darkness, wrath, death. That's the emphasis over and over again in his short book. And right here in this chapter, he's pronouncing the certainty of Israel's judgment.

In fact, he's saying a funeral dirge right now over them as a nation. He's ridiculing their religion, calling it a mockery and a perversion. And notice in verse 7, he says this, Ye who turn judgment to wormwood and leave off righteousness in the earth.

Now, the point here, as he pronounces this judgment, of course, the certainty of judgment upon Israel, he's saying that the men who come seeking justice, instead they find bitterness, because there is no justice in Israel. Everything has been corrupted. Righteousness itself has been cast aside.

It's been discarded.

It's been thrown in the streets. There is no righteousness in Israel.

Then verse 8 and 9, he says, Seek God, he's telling them again.

Verse 8, seek Him that maketh the seven stars, an Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night, that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth.

The Lord, you see it capitalized?

Yahweh is His name, the covenant name of God, that strengtheneth the spoiled against the strong, so that the spoiled shall come against the fortress.

He's the one who formed the universe.

Seek God, not these little calves, not these idols, not these images, not this foolish God of your own imagination, but Yahweh who created all.

The creator of the universe, the creator of the stars, the one who made the daylight and the darkness, the one who made the great seas and the small rains.

Who did it all?

Yahweh.

He says, Yahweh is His name. Covenant name of God. Now, here's, I think, what you see is Amos' question with Israel.

He's saying, in effect, what's happened to you?

What's turned you aside that now you would resort to the worship of images and idols instead of Yahweh, your God.

The one who delivered you from Egypt.

The one who created the universe. The Almighty. Yahweh.

Now, you mistake mere religion, religious activity, for righteousness.

But a religion that doesn't affect our conduct is worthless.

In fact, it's worse than worthless.

It's a great deception.

Because people who are engaged in religious activities actually think that they're right with God.

And that's the great deception of it all.

They think that God's pleased with them.

Because they're religious.

Because they attend church.

Because they do give tithes. Because they do give alms.

Because they're kind to animals, and give the charity, and give of their time to attend religious meetings, and so forth. But they're caught up in a religious treadmill of activity, and they really don't know God. They've had no heart relationship with God.

And there's no real righteousness that only comes by faith in what Christ has done.

It's really a great deception. But here's what Amos says.

They may be religious, but even though they're religious, they hate those who are truly righteous.

Now, this is interesting.

Verse 10.

Look at this verse.

They hate him that rebukeeth in the gate, and they abhor him that speaketh uprightly.

You know what he's saying? The general population...

Now, he's talking about Israel, a religious nation, will actually hate and despise those who stand for holiness, who stand for true worship of God.

Those who speak uprightly and those that rebuke in the gate, that is, those who point out their error, those who point out their sins, their immoral ways, those who stand up for holiness and righteousness are hated by the religious.

Don't equate being religious with being righteous because it's not necessarily so.

But those who are caught up in the religious treadmill but their religion is just an external thing, actually hate the true servants of God who point out their error, who point out their folly, who expose their false ways, and who call them to repentance and call them back to God and to purity and so forth.

Verse 11 and 12.

Amos again denounces their oppression of the poor. For as much therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and you take from him burdens of wheat, you have built houses of hewn stone, but you will not dwell in them.

Vinyards, but you shall not drink wine of them. For I know your manifold transgressions and your mighty sins.

They afflict the just, they take a bribe, and they turn aside the poor in the gate from the right.

Well, Amos is addressing again the rich who are oppressing the poor in order to accumulate their riches.

But he's saying, you're not going to really profit from your riches or benefit from them. You rob the poor and oppress them and take away what little they have in order to build fine palaces and hewn homes for yourselves, but he says, you won't live to enjoy them.

That's his words, too.

You won't live to enjoy them. And you buy all these fine lands and vineyards and so forth, but you won't enjoy that either.

Because you can't oppress the poor and think you'll enjoy the fruit of your sin because you won’t.

God won't allow it to happen. God will judge them.

You know what's interesting I find here?

Here's the rich people.

In order to build their own fine houses, they oppress the poor. They rob, cheat, steal, deceive, resort to all sorts of oppression. In order to build fine homes and lands and things for themselves.

Of course, God says, you'll lose them, you'll lose that, you'll lose your vineyards and so on.

If you seek after the wrong things, material things, houses, lands, wealth, and so forth, you'll lose it.

You'll lose it all.

But on the other hand, God tells us, if you'll seek God, and that's what he's told us over and over here.

And Matthew 633 says what?

Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all those other things, houses, lands, and so forth.

God will just give them to you.

It's all in what you seek.

We're all seekers, you know.

All of us are seekers.

We're all seeking something.

But Israel was seeking the wrong thing.

They were seeking the things of the world, the houses, lands, wealth, riches, material things, money, possessions.

They wanted to accumulate and hoard up.

What they should have been seeking was God.

How many times in this chapter does he tell them, Seek the Lord. Seek the Lord.

Seek the Lord.

Seek the Lord.

Seek the Lord.

What are you seeking?

What is it that's really important to you?

What is it that's on your mind, your heart? If we'll seek the Lord and His righteousness, then all those other things, you know, God says He'll just give them to you.

He'll just bless you with them.

And all the people who seek those things are astonished and angry because they've been seeking after those things and you get them.

And you're not even seeking after them, you're seeking the Lord.

But the Lord just, you know, He'll bless His servants.

I'm telling you, He'll bless His servants.

In fact, the more you're seeking, the more He'll bless you. The more He just wants to bless you.

You ever have the Lord just tell you, I just want to bless you? Let me tell you, sometimes, sometimes it can just overwhelm you.

Sometimes it really can.

If we'll put first things first, seek the Lord, and then just let Him bless us any way He wants to, because He wants to bless His children.

Well, look with me in verse 13.

Here's a rather shocking verse.

Let's read this one.

Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time, for it is an evil time. This speaks of a day, a time that is going to be so hard, so vile, so corrupt, where people have become so hardened over the Word of God, so hardened in their hearts, that God's servants will no longer call them to repentance.

Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time.

There's coming a time, Amos is saying, when the people, they're supposed to be the people of God, they'll be so hard, so cold, so spiritually barren and destitute, so disinterested in the things of God, the way of God, the Word of God, that God's servants won't even call them to repent anymore.

God's servants won't even witness to them anymore, won't even testify to them anymore.

In fact, may not even pray for them anymore.

You know, Ecclesiastes chapter 3 in verse 7 says there's a time to speak, and there's a time to keep silence.

And this passage right here speaks of an evil time where people are so hard that God tells His servants, don't even correct them anymore.

Don't even call them to repent anymore. Don't say anything to them anymore.

It's too late.

It's too late.

Just don't tell them anything.

Let them go on their way towards destruction.

Let them go on their way.

It's time to keep silence.

The time eventually comes when there's nothing more to say.

Now, that's pretty sobering.

There's just nothing more to say.

Israel had been warned.

They'd been rebuked.

They'd been called to repentance.

Prophets had been sent to them over and over.

They had called them to repent, had called them to turn to the Lord.

All of it had been in vain because they'd hardened their hearts, that ignored God's voice, that ignored His prophets.

Now, God was saying He'd speak no more.

He'd warn them no more.

He'd just let them continue to go on their way.

Sometimes there's just nothing more to say.

Sometimes even silence says more than words.

Verses 14 through 17, let's read this.

Seek good and not evil, that you may live.

And so the Lord, the God of hosts, shall be with you as you have spoken.

Hate the evil and love the good, and establish judgment in the gate. It may be, perhaps, if you'll do these things, perhaps the Lord God of hosts will be gracious unto the remnant of Joseph.

Therefore, the Lord, the God of hosts, the Lord saith thus, Wailing shall be in the streets. And they shall say in all the highways, Alas, alas!

And they shall call the husbandmen to mourning, and such as are skillful of lamentation, to wailing.

And in all vineyards shall be wailing, and for I will pass through thee, saith the Lord.

A plea.

He makes a plea, one last plea before their pain would come.

Seek God, do good, he says, and you'll live.

Seek God, do good, you'll be blessed.

Maybe, though judgment has already been pronounced, though the funeral has already begun, maybe if you will do those things, God will be gracious.

If, you'll repent, if you'll seek Him.

But if you continue in sin, if you continue to seek evil, there will be no place, he's saying, no place to hide from judgment.

Notice, he says, how there's going to be wailing in all streets. There's not going to be any place to escape.

No place to hide from the judgment that's going to fall on Samaria, the judgment that's going to fall on the cities.

No street will be an avenue of escape.

All of the highways will have their wailing and mourning.

Remember, this is a funeral that he's talking about.

There's going to be wailing everywhere, a funeral everywhere, because Israel, you're a dead nation.

That's his pronouncement.

You're a dead nation.

Everywhere you go, I'll seek you out.

Judgment will find you out.

There will be no place to hide. And in all vineyards shall be wailing, verse 17, for I will pass through you, saith the Lord.

Now, doesn't that sound like in the Exodus when the angel of death passed through Egypt?

Don't ever think God doesn't judge the wicked because he does. I will pass through you, pass through you in a mighty destruction, a mighty judgment, and there will be mourning. There will be death.

You know, you would hope that Israel would get the message that God is not going to continually tolerate sin and rebellion, that he will deal with it, and he will deal with it in wrath.

In the third section, we see here is verses 18 through 20, the day of the Lord, the day of the Lord.

Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord!

To what end is it for you?

The day of the Lord is darkness and not light, as if a man did flee from a lion and a bear met him, or he went into the house and leaned his hand on the wall and a serpent bit him. So shall not the day of the Lord be darkness and not light, even very dark and no brightness in it?

The day of the Lord, the day of coming judgment, the day of Messiah's coming.

Actually, he's saying, it wouldn't be at all as Israel had expected it to be.

They expected it to be a day of joy, a day of national rejoicing, a day of gladness.

This would be the issuing in of peace.

They were waiting for Messiah.

They expected that all of the nations that had opposed them would be judged at this time, and they themselves would be exalted to a place of preeminence over all the world, and Messiah would reign and rule.

But instead, God is telling them, You seek the day of the Lord.

It's going to be a day of wrath for you, a day of judgment for you.

“You see, they were so deceived by their external religion that they actually thought that this was going to be good for them when the Lord came.

But he's saying it's going to be a day of wrath for you because you're not right with God.

It's going to be a day of darkness for you, not a day of brightness. It's going to be a day of devastation and judgment because you're wicked.

A day without hope, a day of desolation.

The day of the Lord would be contrary to everything that they expected.

It would fall on them in judgment.

You know something? I believe the church is going to find the day of the Lord to be something else than what it expects, too, in many cases. Maybe in most cases.

Because there's a lot of folks who think they're looking forward to the Lord's coming in the clouds.

Some of them are very carnal, very carnal people who are supposed to be Christians.

And they're looking forward to the day of the Lord.

I can't wait for the Lord to return.

You know, this message speaks to that kind of person whose religion is shallow and superficial, whose commitment to the Lord is only surface deep.

They go through the religious motions, but their heart is in this world.

They haven't separated themselves from the world.

They love the things of the world and not the things of the Lord.

They're not really committed to Christ because their lives are inconsistent. Their lives aren't really grounded in the Word of God, but rather it's in worldly things, worldly pursuits.

Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord.

To what end is it for you?

It'll be a day of darkness, not a day of light, because they were wicked. Their hearts weren't right. They weren't ready.

They had no idea what was coming upon them.

They were going to church. They were singing the songs. They were carrying their books.

They thought they were right with God, and God was coming upon them in wrath.

Pretty sober.

But you see the same thing today in Christian circles in America.

You see it in passages in the New Testament, where, well, Luke 17, he speaks about how one will be taken, the other will be left.

Matthew 25, the ten virgins, five were wise, five were foolish.

Five went in, five were locked out.

Matthew 7, 21, not everyone who says unto me, Lord, Lord, is going to enter in in that day.

Some will be locked out of the kingdom.

Even though they've been religious, cast out devils, done wonderful works, given their tithes and offerings, sacrifice of their time and energy. And yet the Lord will say, I don't know who you are.

Depart from me.

So, some, I believe, in this last day are going to find the day of the Lord's coming, not a day of rejoicing, but a day of wrath, a day of darkness, a day of judgment. That's, you know, it's going to be too late when they find out then that they're not even right with God at all.

Their religion is superficial. It's shallow. It's not real.

It's not heart religion.

There's going to be a lot of shocked people.

There's going to be a lot of shocked church members when the Lord returns for his bride.

You know what else I think this passage applies to, who else it applies to? You ever talk to someone who is not even making a pretense of living for the Lord?

I mean, they're just as worldly as can be.

No pretense of church going or having anything to do with the things of God, but you talk to them about heaven, you talk to them about hell, you talk to them about the Lord coming, and they manifest no fear of God at all.

I'm looking forward to meeting the Lord when he comes.

Me and him's tight.

Me, I'm his right-hand man.

I mean, you ever talk to people like that? Just real flippant in their attitude towards the coming of the Lord or hell or eternity or standing before the throne of God.

And they say, man, I'm not worried about standing before God's throne or giving an account of myself.

Man, what do I got to be ashamed of?

And there's lost.

This can be.

Well, they too will find out too late. Unless God interrupts them sovereignly and saves them, they'll find out too late that the day that they think they're looking forward to is going to be a day of darkness, a day of wrath, and not a day of joy and rejoicing.

Then notice this fourth and last section in this chapter, in this chapter five, God's view of man-made religion, verses 21 through 27. I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies when they burn their incense and so forth. Though you offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not accept them.

Neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts.

Now, these people made lots of offerings to God. Take thou away from me, the noise of thy songs, for I will not hear the melody of thy vials. So they sang, they worshiped, they rejoiced, they had instruments.

They gave, they tithed, they sacrificed, they went to the assembly meetings.

But God's saying, take it all away from me.

What I want from you is justice. In other words, I want you to live right.

Not just go to church, not just go to meetings.

I want you to live right.

Let justice run down as waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Verse 24 of chapter 5 is actually the theme of this whole book.

Verse 24, that's the theme of the whole book.

Let judgment run down as waters and righteousness as a mighty stream.

That's what I want from you.

I want you to do right.

I want you to live right.

I want you to be right.

Not just go to meetings, religious meetings.

Have you offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness?

Forty years, O house of Israel.

But you have borne the tabernacle of your malloch and churned your images, the star of your God, which you made to yourselves.

Man-made religion, polluted religion.

You know what they did?

They mixed what was right and true. They took what was right and true and mixed with it what was wrong, what was polluted, what was false with religion.

They had a syncretic religion, a religion of their own making.

They took a little of this, a little bit of that, some of paganism.

They threw it all in with the true worship of God.

It's not much different than what we see today.

It really isn't.

Therefore, will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the Lord, whose name is the God of hosts.

You know, God won't accept polluted religion.

True worship is very simple, and it's pure.

It's always Bible-centered.

If it departs from the Word of God, then God doesn't receive it.

God doesn't want it. God doesn't expect it.

We're not to add to acceptable worship.

He tells us how we're to worship, how we're to pray.

We're not to add to these things.

We're not to add our own special holy days, or holidays, or feast days, or anything else.

We're not supposed to add to what He requires or He expects. And to especially take elements from paganism and try and mix it in with Christianity is an abomination.

It was an abomination then, and it's an abomination now.

In fact, He says, because you've done these things, you've tried to mix paganism with true worship, therefore, I'll cause you to go into captivity. You'll go into bondage.

And that's where the church is today, in bondage.

You see the parallels?

I believe you can.

I want you to turn with me over to one other passage.

We're going to read something over in the book of Amos.

Isaiah.

Isaiah chapter 1.

I want you to turn here with me quickly.

Their failure was they failed to mix morality and ethical behavior with their religious practices, because even though they were religious, they weren't righteous.

They weren't moral. They weren't just.

They were still dishonest, still ungodly.

And also, their sin was that they mixed paganism in with the true worship of God.

This is the same thing Isaiah condemns them for, the same thing.

Notice Isaiah's words.

Chapter 1.

He says in verse 4, For a sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corruptors, they have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger, they are gone away backwards.

They were backslidden, weren't they?

Verse 10, hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom.

Is he talking to literal Sodom? No, Sodom had been destroyed way before, all the way back in Genesis.

He's talking now to Israel just before the Assyrian invasion, just before, just a few short years before, Israel was finally invaded and conquered.

Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom.

He's calling them Sodom.

And ye rulers, give ear to the law of God, ye people of Gomorrah.

To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me, saith the Lord? I'm full of the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed beasts, and I do not delight in the blood of bullocks or of lambs or of he goats.

He says, I'm fed up with all of your sacrifices.

When you come to appear before me, who's required this at your hand to tread my course?

Bring no more vain oblations, incenses and abomination unto me.

The new moons and Sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with.

I can't put up with it.

It's an iniquity.

Even the solemn meeting.

Your new moons and your appointed feasts, my soul hates.

They are a trouble unto me.

I’m weary to bear them. And when you spread forth your hands, they raise their hands in worship, adoration, prayer, praise, and so forth. He says, I will hide my eyes from you.

Yea, when you make many prayers, I will not hear, because your hands are full of blood.

They were corrupt.

There's sin that stained their lives.

So verse 16, he says, Wash you, make you clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes.

Cease to do evil, learn to do well, seek judgment.

What did Amos call them to do?

Let judgment flow as waters.

Let justice come.

That's what he's saying. Do what's right.

Relieve the oppressed.

Judge the fatherless.

Plead for the widow.

Instead of oppressing and robbing them, do what's right.

And verse 18, even at this late date, he says, If you will repent, come now.

Let us reason together, saith the Lord.

Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.

Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

If you're willing and obedient, you'll eat the good of the land.

But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured with the sword, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it.

Just a few short years after Isaiah spoke these words, Assyria carried off Israel captive.

And just as Amos had said, the city where a thousand went out, now only a hundred was left.

Nine-tenths were devoured by sword, by Assyrian captivity.

And the city, the nation, once preeminent, once privileged, became desolate.

There's a lesson here for every nation, in every generation, and of course every individual, that God won't be satisfied with mere external religion. If it doesn't lead us to repentance, it's rotten.

And if our hearts are not in it, then we'll be rejected.

You know, the great danger is just that we just let, we just let it all become a formality, just a ritual, a Wednesday night and Sunday morning ritual.

That we go to church because that's what we're expected to do.

That's what Christians do.

We go, but our hearts aren't in it, you know. Our minds are far off.

We pay little attention.

Our thoughts are elsewhere.

And what do we really seek after?

Is it really the Lord, the Word of the Lord, the presence of the Lord? Is our worship more than just words? Is it something that we express from our hearts?

You know, that's the only thing God will accept. If it's real, if it's personal, if it's external, He'll reject it.

Well, Father, we pray that You will cause our religion to be personal, to bring us always into a right relationship with You, and that Father, what we believe will influence the way we live. Father, deliver us from mere external religion, ceremonialism, ritualism, and deadness.

Father, help us to know You and serve You from the heart. Father, may our seeking always be after You.

Not after things, but after You.

Father, we ask it in Jesus' name, Amen.

Amen, praise God.

Let's stand.”