Today, we continue in our series in the book of Amos. This is going to be a chapter that covers quite a few chapters, because this chapter in general will give us a lot of material from chapters to come. And as we're going to read in just a moment, Amos 3, 1 through 8, God is going to tell us four specific things that he means for us to understand that he is doing, that he does in the life of the people that he loves. And we're going to see that those things are very important to us today, especially in America. As we look around and we see the nation falling apart, we see the continent of Europe falling apart, we see the UK about to give Ireland to the European Union as a bribe. We see all kinds of things going on, abortion and homosexuality and confiscation of your money by tax, so many things going on. And you're gonna see that, why did this happen? Because we have not listened to the true and living God. Listen to the word of God, Amos 3, one through eight. Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family, which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying, you only have I known of all the families of the earth. Therefore, I will punish you for all your iniquities. Can two walk together unless they are agreed? Will a lion roar in the forest and when he is no prey? Will a young lion cry out of his den if he has caught nothing? Will a bird fall into a snare on the earth? where there is no trap for it. Will a snare spring up from the earth if it has caught nothing at all? If a trumpet is blown in a city, will not the people be afraid? If there is calamity in a city, will not the Lord have done it? Surely the Lord God does nothing unless he reveals his secret to his servants, the prophets. A lion has roared. Who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken. who can but prophesy. May God add his blessing to the reading and the hearing of his perfect word. Four things that you just saw in that passage. In fact, in the first two verses, you saw that he speaks. He has spoken. God has spoken to his people. He has delivered his people, and he continues to deliver. He has chosen his family. As the scripture there said, he chooses his family. He has only known one family. And he disciplines those whom he loves, as you heard Ray pray. He just prayed one-fourth of my sermon today, which is very common for that kind of thing to happen. But again, verses one and two, listen again so you can pick up on them again. You can pay attention and catch these. Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt, saying, you only have I known of all the families of the earth. Therefore, I will punish you for all your iniquities. So God speaks. And when he speaks, he intends to be heard. Just like you as a parent, you speak to your children and you don't expect them to ignore you. You expect them to hear you. You expect, you intend to be heard. And he says, hear this word. And if you have your Bible open, if you look at chapter four, verse one, he says, hear this word. And if you look at chapter five, he starts that chapter by hear this word. And this is a solemn command that occurs these three times in a row as he tells us to hear and be obedient to the word of the Lord of the covenant. In fact, dozens and dozens of places throughout the scripture, like Deuteronomy 4.1, O Israel, listen to the statutes and judgments which I teach you to observe, that you may live. In Deuteronomy 6, hear, O Israel, and be careful to observe my words, that it may be well with you. Deuteronomy 6, 4, you all know the great Shema probably. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. We're to hear these truths. And it's important to us for our own good, for our own blessing, to hear this word. The reason it is important to hear this word is because it is the word of Yahweh. It's not the word of some pygmy sitting on a cloud, biting his fingernails, wishing that people could hear him and could understand him and could figure out what he's saying. No, it's God. It's Yahweh. It's the creator of heaven and earth, the one who created you. He created you through a word. You are a creature of language. He is a God who speaks. He communicates with his people. You are to hear him. He has spoken clearly in his word. He has spoken through his world book, but he's spoken most clearly through the word book and through his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. So we need to be hearing him and we need to be we need to be hearing him. so that he can direct us in his ways. You see, our lives are not supposed to go our ways. Our lives are supposed to go his way. Our lives are supposed to be lived the way he wants them lived. We're to be doing what he wants us to be doing. And the good news is, is that he has not left us to ourselves. 2 Timothy 3, 16. A New Testament verse about the Older Testament. All scripture is given by inspiration of God. That all scripture, only the 39 books of the Older Testament were in existence when that verse was written. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that you, the man, the woman of God, may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. But as we think about hearing God's word. It might be time to do a little personal assessment. What is ask yourself, what is what is my personal level of interest in knowing God's word? Do I want to know it to the degree that it is important to my life? Do I recognize the degree to which it is important to my life? Am I pursuing it? Am I hearing it from the scriptures? Am I being taught? Am I being directed in my ways? Am I being corrected? Am I being matured in righteousness? Am I being made more and more like the Lord Jesus Christ? Is the word ruling and overruling my evil desires when I have them? Am I receiving wisdom from the scriptures? Is the scripture, is the word of God my priority? Is God's word, is God's truth defeating and overruling the word of the world? I'll guarantee you that you've heard the world this past week. The world has yelled in your ear and said, come to me. The world has yelled at you and said, follow me or I will hurt you. The world has threatened you in so many ways. And what has God done? He has told you come to him. It may not be delightful. It may have some pain involved in it, but it is him and it is his way and it is his love. And if we let the world drown out the sound of the word of God, then we are in trouble. And I think that when we look around ourselves, unless there is an awakening among those who have never known the Lord, Unless there is a revival among those who have had a taste of the Lord, that our country may not be around much longer. Our government is evil. Our government is an enemy. We need to be careful. Our government is a government that aborts children. It allows the people to abort murdered children. That's a lie. It's sin. It's a culture of death. Homosexuality is promoted. by our president, whom could be removed for high crimes and misdemeanors. I would consider that, and I think God will consider that a high crime and misdemeanor, yet he's there. Critical race theory. I just got a message that Georgia Southern Armstrong has hired a professor of critical race theory. Saddest of all is that much of the church at large has turned away from God's word and follows its own devices and imagination. worship the gospel? How many churches offer strange fire instead of what God's word says in worship? And very disturbingly to me, the gospel is often not the message of the finished work of Jesus Christ, Because to so many minds, Jesus isn't essential. If you look at the mainline churches, when I say mainline, you see United Church of Christ, United Presbyterian, the Episcopal Church. Jesus, they're universalist, which means everybody just goes to heaven, so Jesus really isn't essential. Or you have the churches that have polluted the gospel by saying it's Jesus plus something, Jesus plus your good works, Jesus plus baptism, Jesus plus our through the sacraments. So the church is in trouble too. And in order to not go the way of the world, are the way of the cults. We must be hearing and following the word of Yahweh through the Bible. So I'm gonna go back and ask, I ask you to examine your heart. Let's examine your calendar, so to speak. How's your daily reading and studying of the scripture? Are you availing yourself of the discipleship opportunities and the input that's offered at Reformation Bible Church? Are you availing yourself of the opportunities for worship? What about Wednesday night when we could pray together? We're doing it by Zoom. Don't have to leave your house, but we do need to get in front of the Lord together at eight o'clock, eight to nine o'clock or eight to nine thirty or so. And there's opportunities for fellowship around the word. So we. need to be availing ourselves of these things together so that God can knit our hearts together, so that we can be a team, so that we can do the things together that God wants us to do. So the first thing you saw in Amos 3, one was that he speaks. The second thing you see there is that he delivers. He says in the second part of verse one, I brought you up from the land of Egypt. Now, a while ago, we recited the confirmation of God's truth from Exodus 20. Exodus 20, verse one, and God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. He brought you out of bondage. He didn't bring you out of bondage to put you back in bondage. He didn't bring you out of bondage to make you a slave to sin. He brought you out of bondage to make you his slave and follow his ways, which are really the ways of freedom. Second King 1736, the Lord brought you up from the land of Egypt with great power and an outstretched arm. Him you shall fear, him you shall worship, and to him you shall offer sacrifice. So here we are told why God exercised his great power, why he stretched out his arm on our behalf. First of all, so that we may be free. Of course, that's explicit there. Also, and to many people, this is a very odd statement, that we may fear. We ought to fear God. The third thing we hear is that, so we can worship him in the way that he authorizes, so that we can sacrifice. So how are we free? John 8, 31, Jesus says, if you abide in my word, you are my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. You hear God's word, God's word is truth, the truth shall set you free. You think about the Messiah of the Old Testament, that's the Jesus of the Newer Testament. You think of the message of liberty, the pictures of deliverance are pictures of the gospel in the Newer Testament. Fear, how are we to fear him? Isaiah 8, 13. The Lord of armies, him you shall hallow. And what does hallow mean? Hallow means to set high, set him apart, set him as the first and holy priority in your life. The Lord of armies, him you shall hallow. Let him be your fear. Fear, what is that? It's fear, it's phobos in the Greek, in the Septuagint it's phobos, in the New Testament, New Testament's phobos. Fear, terror, reverence. All of those things together. Let him be your dread. What is dread? I dread certain things and you dread certain things. I dread being embarrassed. I have dreamt of coming through the door, setting up here, and getting ready for the sermon. We go through the worship service, and all of a sudden, I look down and my sermon is gone. I have nothing to preach to you. I dread that. That's a terrifying dream that I have. When I was a cadet on Marine Corps contract, I used to have this dream of sitting on an aircraft carrier, hooked up to the catapult. in an F4 and I was about to be slung into the air and I didn't know what to do. It was terrifying. We're terrified of being embarrassed. We're terrified of failure. We're terrified of all kinds of things. We dread those things, but we should most of all dread sinning. We should most of all dread dishonoring and disappointing our heavenly father. So freedom, fear, and worship. We are to worship God as he authorized in the scripture. John 4, worship in spirit and in truth. Worship through the Lord Jesus, not worship through images or saints or any such thing as that, but we come to him and worship. And then sacrifice. So he wants us to to offer sacrifices. Does that mean burnt offerings? Well, no, we offer the sacrifices of praise and love and obedience. We offer the sacrifice of worship through Christ Jesus. We offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable in him. Romans 12 one, as I said earlier, holy through Christ, acceptable through Christ. Mark 1233 says love him with all the heart with all the understanding with all the soul and with all the strength with all the strength and to love one's neighbor as oneself is more than all the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. So you can sacrifice by loving people in in the way that well, let me put it this way. Love the unlovable. Do you know anybody who's hard to love? It's difficult to love some people. And yet. We're required to love them. And we can't love them begrudgingly. We can't love them hauntingly. We need to just throw ourselves into loving them. Does that mean we have to be super vulnerable? Not necessarily. But it does mean that we need to show them the love that we try to picture what we've received from the Lord. What sacrifice does he want? He wanted Christ's sacrifice. And if you are in Christ, the father wants you as a living sacrifice, Romans 12 one. So he speaks, he delivers. And now we see that he chooses his family. You only have I known. You only have I known. Does this mean that there are people that God does not know about? Well, this is a form of biblical hyperbole. God is showing you that he makes distinctions. Now, of course, there's no one anywhere from any age whom God does not know about and could at any time call by name if he wanted to. In fact, he knows everyone everywhere through all of the ages. He knows them. But he does not know everyone in the sense that they are his people, that they are his elect, that they are adopted, that they are saved members of the family. Yahweh knows the people He has chosen to be adopted into His covenant family and He has chosen them. and no others. He's chosen them with an eternal electing love. He's chosen them with an eternal desire to save them, to deliver them, to make them his. And we understand this better when we see that Jesus, who is God the Son, also does a very similar, or says a very similar thing. In Matthew chapter seven, starting in verse 21, there's a conversation And Jesus, he says, this is verse 721 and following. Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven. Now, there are people who will tell you that if you just say Jesus Christ is Lord and give a nod, you are saved. That's false. That's so, far from being the gospel of Jesus Christ and his work on our behalf. It's just outlandish. But not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my father in heaven. And what is the will of his father in heaven? That you might know him and know his son, Jesus Christ, that you might embrace the work of the Lord Jesus. Verse 22, many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name, cast out demons in your name, and done many wonders in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you, depart from me, you who practice lawlessness. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness, I never knew you. Now he knew them and that they had done many things, many good and powerful things in his name. He knew them and that they had practiced lawlessness, but he did not know them with saving love or as members of his elect. He did not know them as his family. So in this sense, God the Father could tell some of the children of Israel And Jesus could tell some of the religious people of John 5 that they were unknown and that they were to depart from him. The Hebrew word for know is, it has a wide range of meanings, but here the word means sovereign grace. He chose to know these people in a way that they could be the special recipients of his grace, his mercy, his gracious gifts, especially salvation, which is followed by sanctification. When God makes covenant with people, he always makes covenant stipulations. It's not meritorious stipulations, but the stipulations are for us to follow, for them to follow. So that's why we keep attending to the law. You read the 10 commandments and the first and second great commandment today, because that is God's covenant word to you, his covenant people, and that is what he expects of you And when you fail, he forgives you, but not if you are promiscuous about it, not if you just really just don't care, don't attend to it. Deuteronomy seven, six, for you are a holy people to the Lord your God. Why are you holy to the Lord your God? Because he has declared you holy to him in Christ. It's not because you've made yourself holy or you've become holy. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. Deuteronomy 7, 6. Exodus 19, 4 through 6. You have seen what I did to the Egyptians. He's reminding them that he drowned the Egyptians. He's reminding them that he sent plagues to the Egyptians, that he killed the firstborn of the Egyptians. He's reminding them of what he did to the Egyptians. They did none of it. You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I bore you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. It's him who brought us to himself, brought them to himself. Now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to me above all people. For all the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel. And these are words that you shall speak to the children of the church, and the adults of the church, and the old people of the church, and to everyone. You see, when we talk about choosing, we're talking about election. When we talk about Messiah, we're talking about Jesus Christ. When we talk about Israel, we're talking about the church. When we talk about true Israel, we're talking about the true church. You see, there are counterfeits of all of those things. That's why we need to hear the word of the Lord, so that we know what the counterfeit is and what the real thing is. And this principle of gracious election, it applies to the church very clearly because John 15, 6 says, you did not choose me, but I chose you. He's choosing in the Older Testament, he's choosing in the Newer Testament, he's choosing in eternity past, and he's choosing into eternity future. First Peter 2.9, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people. God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, says Ephesians 1.4. And it was not because there was anything in us that made us loved by him. It was what was in him that made him love us in spite of us. And all of these reasons, are brought together in this passage. So he speaks to his people, he delivers his people, he chooses his family, and he disciplines his family when needed. Moses, whom God loved, was disciplined. David, whom God loved, was disciplined. Moses and David, just two examples. They were disciplined and they were kept. They were disciplined because they belonged to him in a special way. Haman, he was disciplined, he's in hell. Judas, he was disciplined, he's in hell. Proverb 312, for whom the Lord loves, raise prayer, he corrects, just as a father the son in whom he delights. If God loves you, he's gonna spank you at the right time and in the right way. God delights in those who are his chosen, and he disciplines them in love. And God the Holy Spirit is part of this. He does this wonderful work, this work we know as conviction, conviction of sin. If you are a Christian, if you are a true Christian, if you are a member of the true Israel, the true church, when you commit a sin, You do not commit that sin without conviction. If you commit sin without conviction, you need to be terrified that God is letting you go. You need to be terrified that you don't belong, that the Father doesn't love you as he loves a son. So he is, the Holy Spirit is the discomforter. He convicts us, John 16, eight, and when he has come, he will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. And not only does Proverbs 312 say that whom the Lord loves, he rebukes and disciplines. Hebrews 12, six says for whom the Lord loves, he rebukes and chastens and scourges every son whom he receives. What does scourge mean, scourge? He brings pain, pain of conscience, pain of body sometimes, pain of social structure, stature sometimes, all kind of ways. Well, as we think about the first two verses of this, the next six verses answer questions that we may use to test ourselves. Are we hearing? Have we been delivered? Have we been chosen to be in his family, and are we being disciplined for our own good in his glory? Now, there are nine questions in the rest of this passage in these next six verses, and they're real fast. In verse three, can two walk together unless they be agreed? Agreement with God, who is never wrong and whose word never changes, is essential if we're going to walk with him. He's not gonna change his mind. We must change our minds. We must conform to his will. He will not conform to our will. So we must, how can two walk together unless they be agreed? Do we have holdouts? Do we think God is too, I'll tell you the one that I see the most, child discipline. Do we think that when God says you're to spank your children, that's just, oh no, we can't do that. You've seen that, right? And what do we get on the other end? Anyway, so when his child needs a spanking, he ought to get a spanking because the father and the mother who are his parents should love him enough to do that. In verse four, will a lion roar in the forest when he has no prey? God is speaking. in a way that he wants to have effect in our lives. Does a lion roar before it has prey? No, it's being stealthy. But when it roars, God says he roars for a purpose. He wants to be heard. He roars and there is a purpose. In Isaiah 1110, it says, the Lord will roar like a lion, and when he roars, his son shall come trembling. If you're a child of God, you hear this terrifying roar, but that terrifying roar is not really against you if you come to him, it's only against you if you run from him. You can't run from the Lord. There's no place you can go, says Psalm 139, in all of the universe. Also, will a young lion cry out of his den if he has caught nothing? When young lions, I don't know anything about lions except what I've read and what I've seen on the channel, but when young lions have not caught their prey, they also move around quietly and with stealth. And the point here is that God is, he's roaring through Amos because his prey, Israel, is his and they can't get away. He's, so to speak, creeping up on them. The church must hear God's words and follow and walk with him. in agreement with him. And if Israel feels secure while they're in their sin, then Israel is a foolish nation, just like America is a foolish nation. The fourth question in verse five, will a bird fall into a snare on the earth where there is no trap for it? The world is full of traps. Don't we see the death and the destruction that comes when we ignore God's word and God's warnings? How many people do we see in these traps? The traps around us, they have not sprung up and captured people and captured people's minds and captured institutions like our government, like our educational system, like our banking system, like our so forth for no reason. It's because people have stopped listening to the word of God. They are prone to fall into these traps. They can't help but fall into these traps. You'll be caught. The fifth question, will a snare spring up from the earth if it has caught nothing at all? And the people of Israel may try to ignore these snares. The people of America may try to ignore these snares, but they will be caught. The sixth question, in verse six, if a trumpet is blown in a city, will not the people be afraid? The trumpet was sounded in these cities as a warning. There were certain sounds for a warning, and that's what this trumpet is meaning, a warning, a warning. The trumpet is God's word sounding the warning of his judgment on sin, his discipline, on his family. You see, because you belong to God, you can expect him to pay more attention to you and to be, more engaged in disciplining you, more engaged in getting into your mind and causing you to not want to leave him, to be discomforted when you're pulling away from him, to be heartbroken and to be dissatisfied when you're not following his ways. The trumpet of God's word is sounding the warning on his judgment of sin. Seventh question, if there is calamity in a city, will not the Lord have done it? There's nothing that happens that doesn't happen because of the Lord's command, the Lord working his purpose out in the affairs of men. Ephesians 1.11 says he works all things according to the counsel of his will. In Galatians 6, 7, do not be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. What we are sowing, what this nation is sowing, what the church is sowing, they're going to reap. And when we see the colossal ignorance of the churches and of the nation of what the scripture teaches, it's what they've sown. They've sown a lot of TV watching. They've sown a lot of, electronic game, video game watching. They've sown a lot of playing, a lot of hobbies and sports, but they're not sowing to the word of the Lord. And Lamentations 3, 38, is it not from the mouth of the Most High that woe and well-being proceed? God takes credit for woe and well-being in Lamentations 3, 38. And then in verse 39, he says, why should any living man complain in view of a sin? If God sends you woe, you have no place to complain. I have no place to complain in view of my sin. And then he goes on, let us search out and examine our ways and turn back to the Lord. Let us lift our hearts and hands to the God of heaven. because we have transgressed and rebelled. It's so interesting, I think, that we can lift our hearts and our hands to the God of heaven, even though we have transgressed and rebelled. Why? Not because lifting our hearts and our hands to heaven makes everything all right, but everything is made all right by the Lord Jesus Christ, and then we can lift our hearts and our hands to heaven. Do you see the way the arrow's pointing there? You are not earning anything by your worship. Because Jesus earned everything, you are allowed to worship and lift your hearts and your hands to the God in heaven. Eight, a lion has roared, it says, and then who will not fear? The Lord God has spoken. Who won't fear? I'm not big enough to not fear. I haven't been afraid of many things in my life, but I'm afraid of God. I am terrified of disappointing, dishonoring God. I'm terrified of not giving him his due. Do I give him his due? No. And when I don't, Holy Spirit convicts me. And what do I do? I ask forgiveness for not giving him his due, and then Jesus gives him his due on my behalf. You got that? I need Jesus. I would be terrified to be in the presence of God, the Father, our God, the Holy Spirit who killed Ananias and Sapphira. If it weren't for Jesus, the lion has roared. And then who can but prophesy the final question, prophesy, foretell or foretell? the prophets and the apostles foretold. Ray and I forth tell. We take what they wrote, what they said under inspiration, and we forth tell it, we declare it. And Amos must declare God's word. But here's the point for us. So must we declare God's word. We must learn the scriptures, and we must warn our neighbors, and we must tell them of the safety that is full and complete, but only in Jesus Christ. We must study and teach God's word when we're competent. Don't teach the scriptures before you're competent, but when you become competent, teach the scriptures. And until you're competent, learn the scriptures and be around those people who really, really know what they're talking about. Be salt and light in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. Let us prophesy, let us foretell what God has clearly said for everyone, in the presence of everyone, so to speak, but to anyone who will hear us, and let us repent and return to Him. Because, as Revelation 3, 19 says, another time, as Ray prayed, as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten, therefore be zealous and return. Amen.