Kayla March Series: Message: Main Idea

1 1 November 25, 2018 Kayla March Series: Blind Spots: The Book of Amos message : Blind Spots on Judgment and Hope Main Idea: We can trust God with our lives, because he is faithful to bring redemption out of suffering. Purpose: To encourage the congregation to trust in the Lord to bring redemption as the final end to our story. Text: Amos 8-9 I. Introduction For the last 5 weeks, we ve been reading through the book of Amos, giving particular attention to what the prophet reveals about Israel s blindspots. We see our story in Israel s story. It s the human story. - We love stories of conflict and struggle, when the underdog faces some big challenge and prevails against the villain, because they speak to our own reality of conflict and struggle. - It gives us great pleasure when good conquers evil; we feel a renewed sense of hope for the world.

2 How a story ends will dictate whether we walk away feeling hopeful or feeling disheartened; whether we feel vindicated or frustrated; whether we experience joy, great sadness, or somewhere in between. - The end reveals the purpose of the author, and the goal or true meaning of all that precedes it. - Just like anything else in life, if we understand the end goal, we understand where we re headed; we understand our purpose and how to get there. When we misunderstand the end goal (the ending of a story), it taints the way we read and understand the rest of the chapters. When we get the ending wrong, we get everything wrong. II. The Day of the Lord As we read Amos together, we realize that Israel had all kinds of blindspots when it came to how they treated one another, how they treated outsiders, how they ran their businesses, how they worshiped.

3 - These blindspots originated from a major misunderstanding of where their own story was headed. Quick recap of their story: - Remember Israel was a community founded on the promises of God. - God calls on Abraham and promises to make him into a great nation, to bless him and make his name great. This nation, Israel, would be God s covenantal people. A people with whom he would have a unique relationship. - This nation was to live their lives and build their society under God s reign and by his rules. - Essentially, they would be a model society, a community that would reveal to the world God s love and justice, attracting all other nations to Yahweh as the one true God. - Through Israel, a blessing would come for everybody, for all nations. - Israel gets off to a rough start, spending hundreds of years as slaves in Egypt, but God delivers them from their oppressors and brings them into a land of their own.

4 This great act is known as Passover and referred to by the people as the day. Israel celebrates this day every year, and it starts to generate a hope for a new Day of the Lord. 2 The perfect ending to an underdog prevails story, when Yahweh would return to wipe out the powers of the oppressive empires that surrounded Israel, just like when he did so with Egypt. On this day, God would wipe everyone else out and prop up Israel as the true rulers of the world. What a great ending for Israel: The Day of the Lord. Or so they III. Judgment Amos 5:18-20 - There was one problem with Israel s understanding of The Day of the Lord : Yahweh would return to wipe out the corruption and injustice of oppressive empires. Israel couldn t fathom that it would be them on the receiving end of God s judgment.

5 At one time, having been the oppressed and having been saved by God from slavery, they themselves had now become the oppressors. And the Lord wasn t going to be making exceptions for them. This is the message that Amos brings. As we get to the end of the book, chapters 8 and 9 are mostly more pronouncements of this coming judgment. There would be no avoiding it, no escaping it. Amos 8:9-10 - Death of an only son. In ancient Israel, the death of an only son meant saying goodbye to all hope of the family continuing on. It is the end. If the only son of Israel dies, Israel ends. No more offspring. No more progeny. No hope. We know that the day of the Lord did come. - Amos delivered his message around 750 BC, and a couple decades later, in 722 BC, Assyria comes down and wipes out Israel.

6 They take out Samaria, the capital city, and the whole northern kingdom is plundered. Many were killed. Those who survived were taken into exile. IV. Redemption We have to keep reading, because the words of Amos don t actually end in judgment. - When we get to the very end of the last chapter, God says (Amos 9:8, 11-15): Amos 9:8 ..Yet I will not totally destroy the descendants of Amos 9:14 ..I will bring my people Israel back from Amos 9:15 ..never Perhaps even more shocking than the message of judgment itself was the message that this coming death and exile of God s people was actually a part of God s much larger story of redemption. - The shocking message was that Israel must die in God s redemption plan. - Exile was unavoidable. Judgment for sin was surely coming, and it did indeed come, but redemption through the line of David was still the promise.

7 - Amos ends with the proclamation that God will not abandon his people or his promise. - Redemption and hope get the final word. Israel s story, in the end, wasn t about them. - Did God desire to bless them and give them good gifts of land, wealth, and prosperity? Yes. - God also desires to bless us, but not so that we can become fat and happy and dominate over other people. Rather, so that in our obedience to him as God s covenant partners we would prosper as we walk the way of wisdom and carry out justice in our community. 3 - We would be lights to everyone around us, bringing about flourishing for us and for everyone else! God s story wasn t about world domination by God s people. It wasn t a story about the good guys ( Israel, so they thought) conquering the bad guys ( everybody else).

8 - The lines between the good guys and the bad guys are really fuzzy in the Story. It s not about the good people conquering the bad people. - The story is about a good God conquering evil a just and loving God redeeming and reclaiming every corner of his creation from the power of sin and death. That s why tribalism doesn t work. - There is no us versus them in God s way of doing things. - This is why hoarding wealth for self doesn t make any sense. - God s people are to steward the resources that God has given them for the flourishing of all. Israel misunderstood what their story was really about and where it was headed, and it created major blindspots for them. V. Conclusion Although we share a lot of Israel s story and see ourselves in it, we are in a very different position today than they were then.

9 Amos 8:9-10 - Amos 8:9 ..I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight. - Amos 8:10 ..like mourning for an only Witnesses of Jesus death report that the sun went down at about the sixth hour (noon); and darkness came upon the earth in broad daylight as a father mourned for his only son. This is our story. - When the day came for judgment and punishment for our sin, our God took our place. - The shocking message of the gospel is that Jesus must die in God s redemption plan. - Jesus, the true Israel, the true son of God, was willing to lay down his life in our place. But the death of an only son wasn t the end. There s more to the story. We gotta get the ending right. - The resurrection of Jesus means that God took death and turned it into new life.

10 - He took the end and turned it into a new beginning. Here s the shocking message for us: it s all grace. It s just a gift. (Ephesians 2:4-9) - Forgiveness, redemption, and new life are the gifts of a loving Father. (Ephesians 1:7-8) Israel misunderstood where their story was heading, and it created major blindspots for them. Where is your story heading? - Can you see the redeeming thread of God s grace in your life, through both the good and the bad circumstances? - Can you see far enough out that even in the chapters of your story that make no sense, or make you want to give up, you see a God who refuses to abandon you, who refuses to abandon his promises? Next week is the beginning of the Advent season. This is a time for followers of Christ to celebrate the first coming of Jesus and to anticipate his coming again.