Amos · chapter 3 of 9
Updated on
Amos 3 says that Israel, the people the Lord knew among all the families of the earth, will be punished for its wrongdoing. Through rhetorical questions Amos shows that judgment has clear causes, that the Lord reveals his plans to the prophets, and that Samaria, full of violence, will be plundered and its altars at Bethel torn down.
After the verdicts on the nations, chapter 3 speaks to Israel directly: three sections begin with the call to hear this word. Amos explains why no people has special permission to sin, not even the one the Lord chose, and he defends his own calling as a prophet with a series of questions.
Amos asks all the children of Israel, the family the Lord brought up from Egypt, to hear the word against them. The Lord knew them alone among all the families of the earth, and therefore he will punish them for all their iniquities. Election is not a license to sin but a responsibility.
Then the prophet poses a series of questions with obvious answers: do two walk together unless they have agreed to meet? Does a lion roar in the forest without prey? Does a bird fall in a trap with no bait? Is a trumpet blown in a city without the people being alarmed? Each shows that events have causes. So too, if disaster falls on a city, the Lord has done it. The Lord does nothing without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets. The lion has roared, who will not fear? The Lord has spoken, who can but prophesy?
Amos summons the strongholds of Ashdod and Egypt to gather on the mountains of Samaria and see the great unrest and oppression within it. Its people do not know how to do right and store up violence and destruction in their palaces. Therefore an enemy will surround the land, bring down its strongholds and plunder its palaces. As a shepherd rescues from the lion's mouth only two legs or a piece of an ear, so the people of Israel who live in Samaria will be rescued, reduced to the corner of a couch and a scrap of a bed.
The Lord will punish Israel's transgressions on the day he visits the altars of Bethel: the horns of the altar will be cut off and fall to the ground. He will strike the winter house and the summer house, and the houses of ivory will perish and the great houses will come to an end.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The Lord knew Israel among all the families of the earth, and therefore he will punish it for its iniquities. Election brings more responsibility, not less: to whom much has been given, much is asked.
The question about two walking together without agreement opens a series of examples of cause and effect. Amos wants his audience to see that calamity is no accident but the result of a broken relationship with God.
The Lord does nothing without revealing his plan to his servants the prophets. This explains why Amos speaks: God warns before he acts, and the prophet is the messenger of that warning.
The lion roars and whoever hears it trembles; the Lord speaks and the prophet cannot stay silent. Amos does not speak on his own initiative but because the word of God compels him.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: Israel, the people he brought up from Egypt. — Amos 3:1-2
Answer: Whether two walk together without having agreed to meet. — Amos 3:3
Answer: Nothing: he does nothing without first revealing his secret to the prophets. — Amos 3:7
Answer: The strongholds of Ashdod and the strongholds of the land of Egypt. — Amos 3:9
Answer: Two legs or a piece of an ear, a sign that only a small part will remain. — Amos 3:12
Answer: The horns of the altar will be cut off and fall to the ground. — Amos 3:14
Amos 3 challenges the idea that belonging to God's people gives us immunity. Being known by the Lord means living in line with that knowledge. In a Sunday school class you can ask whether we use our church membership to feel safe while tolerating injustice around us.
We can also learn from Amos's method: simple questions that help us see causes. When painful things happen to us, it is wise to ask humbly whether God wants to tell us something, without hastily concluding that every suffering is a punishment. And whoever carries a message from God must do so with courage, because when God speaks, it is hard to stay silent.
Amos 3 explains that judgment on Israel is not arbitrary: the Lord warns, and the violence of Samaria makes it inevitable. In chapter 4 the prophet will describe, with irony, the wealthy women of Samaria and the empty religion of Bethel and Gilgal.
Knowing here means choosing and entering into a covenant relationship. It does not mean God ignores the other nations, since Amos already judged them in chapters 1 and 2, but that Israel received a special relationship and a special responsibility.
The verse says that if disaster comes to a city, the Lord has done it. In context it refers to calamities sent as judgment for sin, not to moral evil. The Bible presents God as just, acting against the evil his people commit.
They were the projections at the corners of the altar, which served as a place of refuge and ritual. Cutting them off symbolizes that the altar of Bethel, the center of the northern kingdom's religion, will no longer offer protection.